Black and white versus colour. Eugène Atget, Sally Mann and Michael Schmidt
The great benefit of color vision is that it adds both visibility and perceptual uniqueness to visualized objects, making it easier both to discriminate them (i.e., distinguish them from surrounding objects or backgrounds) and to identify them (i.e., know what they are, based on their color). Color vision is important for orientation and navigation, for identifying conspecifics, for detecting predators and/or prey, and for recognizing visual signals produced by other organisms.
T.W. Cronin, in Evolution of Nervous Systems, 2007
The examples for Atget, Mann and Schmidt given here, are all in black and white. While the choice of colour may not have been available to Atget, this was a deliberate choice for both Mann and Schmidt.
If colour is used to aid identification, to orientate and navigate, it would follow that the removal of this would change our appreciation of an image leaving us separated from our normal understanding of the world and what the image may represent.
Sally Mann’s Southern Landscapes
In her southern landscapes series, Mann took inspiration from a number of photographic plates she found which dated from the American Civil war. She recreated the scratched, muted look in her own images (Goldberg, 1997). By filming in black and white she tunes into our belief that lack colour equates old and thus makes her images hard to date – timeless.
‘Shrouded in fog and wavering outlines, struck by radiant light or swallowed by shadows that hungrily eat up form, these landscapes are deeply romantic, poignant, often beautiful’ (Goldberg, 1997).
4.2.7 
Fig 1. Sally Mann – Southern Landscapes: Deep South – Swamp Bones
Fig 2. Sally Mann – Southern Landscapes: Virginia – Dark Mist
Mann used extremes of exposure, either to darken the entire scene leaving little to be seen or overexposing so that the light overwhelms the image (Goldberg, 1997) Goldberg notes of Mann’s photographs ‘No doubt these were pleasant enough decked out in nature’s green under light-filled blue skies ‘ but that her techniques – the black and white, the use of exposure, gives them a different and more romanticised feeling.
Her focus is soft and the light quality dreamy, particularly in Swamp Bones the lack of colour does remove our usual navigation points for the image. Dark Mist is indistinct; both leave a lot to the imagination
Mann, unlike Schmidt or Atget, used light to create an illusion rather show the reality of a scene.
Eugène Atget
The Art Story says of Atget that he ‘focused on creating record of pictorial space’ (2021). As mentioned in the EYV course folder, until later in his life, he preferred to use an even light as ‘best to convey information.’
The Art Story website quotes Walker Evans in The Reappearance of Photography, ‘His general note is lyrical understanding of the street, trained observation of it, special feeling for patina, eye for revealing detail, overall which is thrown a poetry which is not the poetry of the street or the poetry of Paris but the projection of Atget’s person.’
Michael Schmidt
Photography was invented to enable us to portray reality with complete precision to the last detail.
Michael Schmidt – 1979
His aim was to produce documentary photographs which allowed the viewer to see and interpret what was seen with minimal influence from the photographer.
His preference was for black and white – in reality a variety of shades of grey. He felt it brought a ‘neutrality’ to his work, removing personal preferences and subjective feelings around colour. This also informed his use of a ‘neutral, diffused light’ (ASX, 2010)
‘The viewer must allow the objects portrayed in the photograph to take their effect upon him without being distracted by shadows or other mood effects. In this context, it is essential that the viewer should be able to recognize the depicted objects clearly and in relation to each other.’ (Schmidt, M -1979).
I’m not sure how the comment above squares with the fact that colour vision developed to allow humans to better identify objects and navigate their world. He attempts to show what is, but is this ever truly possible? As photographers, we frame things out and even though there may be no quaint decisive moment, still the moment is chosen and will forever be different from the one before.
In 2014 he was a prize winner of the 5th Prix Pictet on consumption and environmental sustainability. He created a series of photographs which he called Lebensmitte which explored the way food was processed in Europe from farm or field to factory. These photographs show the way his work developed in later life where ‘he was drawn to series over single images, atmosphere over documentary representation’ (O’Hagan, 2014). His heavily cropped image of pigs squashed together highlights the problem of intensive farming – just one, sad, little eye is visible.
References
American Suburb X (2010) Micheal Schmidt – Thoughts About My Way of Working 1979 [Online] ASX. Available at: https://americansuburbx.com/2010/10/michael-schmidt-thoughts-about-my-way-of-working-1979.html. Accessed on 02/01/21
Goldberg, V. (1997)PHOTOGRAPHY REVIEW; Landscapes That Are Steeped in Time [Online] New York Times. Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/1997/10/17/arts/photography-review-landscapes-that-are-steeped-in-time. Accessed on 02/01/21
O’Hagan, S. (2014) Michael Schmidt obituary [Online} The Guardian Available at : https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2014/may/28/michael-schmidt. Accessed on 02/01/21
The Art Story (2021) Eugène Atget [Online] Available at: https://www.theartstory.org/artist/atget-eugene/ Accessed: 02/01/21
T.W. Cronin, (2007) 1.23 – Evolution of Color Vision and Visual Pigments in Invertebrates. [Online] Available at: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/B0123708788090108
Accessed on: 02/01/21
Images
Mann, S ( ) Southern Landscapes [Online] Available at https://www.sallymann.com/southern-landscapes Accessed on: 02/01/21
Katies Photographic Journey 