Tent-Camera Image: Rapidly Moving Clouds Over Field #1, Flatford, England, 2017
Tent-Camera Image: Rapidly Moving Clouds Over Field #2, Flatford, England, 2017
Tent-Camera Image: Constable's Hay Wain View, Flatford, England, 2017
Tent-Camera Image: Copper Beech Tree in Hampstead Heath, London, England, 2017
Tent-Camera Image: Pond in Hampstead Heath, London, England, 2017
Tent-Camera Image: Clouds and Trees on Grass in Hampstead Heath, London, England, 2017
Tent-Camera Image: Clouds Over Field, Flatford, England, 2017
After Constable
In June 2017 I traveled to England with my tent-camera in search of landscapes where John Constable painted. My tent-camera images are rendered on the ground, resulting in a photograph that suggests the painting effect of his own canvases. These photographs are an attempt to make contemporary images with Constable in mind- I did not want to copy what he looked at –rather I strived to look at the English landscape in his spirit. I made these images in the Flatford area of East Anglia and in Hampstead Heath in London.
The History of my Tent Camera
Observing the landscape with specially equipped tents and lenses was practiced by artists in the 18th and 19th century and even earlier in order to trace on paper what they saw projected in the darkness of their tents. Interestingly, this approach to picturing the land was taken even before the invention of photography in 1839.
In considering this old way to envision the landscape I began to design ways that I could use to do the same thing in 2010. Over the years my design has improved my picture making and now with my latest incarnation of the Tent Camera my pictures have become sharper and more vivid. This is the device that I used to make pictures in the South of France in the Summer of 2022
Essentially, I am now using a light tight tent with a periscope type lens on top so that any landscape can be projected onto the ground inside the darkened space of the tent. I also have a digital camera next to the periscope looking down towards the ground to capture the sandwich of the landscape projection and the dirt and rocks of the ground surface. I no longer need to be inside the tent because my camera is operated with a connected laptop outside. This new design is smaller and more portable too.
