Its seems like it should be strange, as if we shouldnt look at his stuff cause its old or something and he couldnt have used a computer, but it makes sense to look at his work. I think its neat that we look at his stuff in a photoshop. For example, Oscar Rejlander, he was apparently one of the first and maybe the first guy to combine photos the way he did. I like the first people he shows us because they did all of their work without photoshop. Anyway, our teacher seems to choose artists who first started the kind of work that we are doing and then newer artists. I'm not sure how these artists relate to the newest project, but they do relate to a photoshop class because they all have to do with combining photos and what not.
He also shows a few artists to give us a better idea of what we can do for the project. I think that the artists the teacher shows us are usually pretty interesting to look at because he basically shows us artists whose work relates to the project. London: The Focal Press, 1942.We looked at a few photographers today in computer imaging. "Rejlander, Oscar Gustaf (1813–1875), photographer." Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. The subtitle, or alternative title, emphasises the idea that that side must be foresworn. In fact, the Photographic Society of Scotland refused to exhibit it at first (see Yoxall 23), and when they finally showed it in 1858, they hid that side with a discreet curtain. Naturally, it was the left side, with its half-dressed figures, that offended people. Despite the appeal of its moralism, it was deemed “indelicate” and opened "long-drawn-out discussions about the question of whether photography was a suitable technique for creating 'that sort of thing'” (Strasser 60). The finished work was first shown at the Manchester Art Treasures Exhibition of 1857 (see Hacking, and Yoxall 19).
Juliet Hacking tells us that Rejlander's preparations, involving a number of individual studies for the figures, and the joining of thirty images, took him six weeks. Right: The side showing the sins of the flesh (slightly enhanced version). One such was Prince Albert himself, who bought three versions of it (see Hacking). The panoramic scale as well as the moralism would have appealed to the Victorians, while the technicalities involved would have impressed those interested in the new art of photography. On the left is the lure of semi-clothed women, sirens representing the sins of the flesh on the right are virtuous women engaged in reading, devotions and caring for others. These deal with the personal side of life. Against a background of men engaged in various kinds of work, they confront two set-pieces like the tableaux vivant which the Victorians loved to stage at their parties. An allegorical study of the two paths open to young men on the verge of adult life, it shows a sage (a typical Victorian figure) pointing out the alternative possibilities to the men. This is Rejlander's best-known work at the time, it was also his most controversial one.
Image download, text and formatting by Jacqueline Banerjee. Image source: Wikiart, where it is described as being in the public domain. Two Ways of Life (Hope in Repentance), by Oscar Gustaf Rejlander.