Sigmar Polke Analysis.

Sigmar Polke was a German painter and photographer from Cologne, Germany whose work focuses a lot on documenting various landscapes, street environments and societal areas within Germany as well as the human impact on the landscapes that he is documenting within his photographs as well as the effects that we may have on our society and the environments that we live in, using the formal elements of lighting, colours and compositions. For this artist analysis, I will be specifically looking at his street and landscape photographic series that he has created using a combination of paint and liquid emulsion and other chemicals in  response to the theme of 'Society' for this project. I decided to document and research the work of Sigmar Polke in relation to this theme as I intend to take a series of photographs that document the urban society that I live in and around - such as Croydon, Kingston, London and Bromley - and the impact that we have on our own society such as graffiti, street art, construction, homelessness and the general lack of care that we show our society and the environments that we live in. This is something that I felt inspired by whilst researching and analysing the work of Sigmar Polke as I really like how he uses the formal elements of colour and composition to draw attention to minor details within the landscape or street environment that he is documenting within his photographic work in order to emphasize or highlight the type of society and people that live in these environments and how they may have constructed and effected the landscape around them.

Many of Sigmar Polke's photographs are kept central using the rules of thirds with a range of long-distance, closeups and mid-shot compositional angles in order to document the urban landscapes and the impact that we have on our society. Despite Sigmar Polke's photographs being based around the theme of landscape and street photography he tends to capture some of his imagery in the portraiture camera angle which I feel helps give his photographs the sense that the landscapes and street photography are very claustrophobic and gritty areas, similar to the work of Saul Leiter and William Eggleston.

A lot of the photographs that Sigmar Polke has taken in order to create his project are based around various urban landscapes and street environments

that make up the society that he is documenting within his work. He often focuses a lot of his landscape and street photographic works on the uses of the formal elements of lighting and colour as well as the composition of the photograph itself in order to emphasize specific areas of focus within his imagery whilst also making some of the street and interior photographs feel more claustrophobic and gritty due to the texture of the liquid emulsion and chemical techniques that the artist uses within his work, combined with the compositional angles of his images, which also helps to create a leading line of focus within his photography. This is something that I could potentially take inspiration from within my own landscape photographic work responding to the theme of 'Society' by documenting photographs of the urban society using different tones, colours, lighting, compositions and editing techniques to highlight a specific element or section of the landscape or street that I will be documenting within my photographs to emphasize a theme of grittiness and claustrophobia of city life.

Within my own photographic response I have decided to take a series of landscape and street
photographs that will document the theme of 'Society' by photographing the different urban environments of Croydon, Kingston, London and Bromley and the damages and lack of care that humans have for their own society within my photographs, focusing on the grit and grime that the city and town landscapes may have such as graffiti, homelessness, street art and damages to buildings and the like as well as the changes that we are often making to our own society such as construction sites and the demolishment of buildings.