Stephen Vaughen

I like how this image reminds me of my times spent in the highlands of Scotland on Munro's there, it reminds me of small rocky outcrops, where the snow is resisting the thaw and staying frozen in the shadows caused by the rugged nature of the dense volcanic rock there.

These two pictures (above and below) remind me of Paul Corcoran's work, with the decay of the landscape. Paul Corcoran's photographs are a representation of how he feels about current events. These are more directly linked to the way volcanic lava forms new rock and how over millions of year this is slowly broken down.

This picture reminds me of Edward Burtynskys work, though not as epic in scale, it reminds me of the red of the iron decaying in one of his photographs.

I like how his photographs have a structure to the narrative, it is quite circular, with each image connected to another earlier, or later in the series, they have similar compositions, and similar subject matter, such as small rocks in the foreground and ice and mist blowing through the image, until it is almost washed out to nothing. I think he framed his series like this to represent a circular nature in volcanic activity and the repetition of the volcanic eruptions and decay of rock formations by wind and weather over millennia.

Ultima Thule:

The exhibition takes its title from Ultima Thule, a term used in ancient history to describe the mysterious northern frontier, representing a distant unknown region at the extreme limit of exploration and discovery. Vaughan’s work is inspired by the actual voyage made 2300 years ago by the Greek explorer Pytheas, who travelled to the edge of the then known world beyond Britain, towards Iceland and the Arctic Circle. 

Over the last four years Vaughan has revisited the Icelandic landscape, to sites that are the nearest equivalent on Earth to the surfaces of the Moon and Mars, and which were used for training lunar astronauts. His work links Pytheas’ ancient voyage of discovery to the present day and the persistent human urge to explore unknown territory.

Using a cumbersome large-format Gandolfi camera, Vaughan made richly detailed, monumental studies of this otherworldly region. These awe-inspiring images reveal landscapes marked by volcanic activity, shifting tectonic plates, vast glaciers and steaming, sulphurous pools.

Vaughan says, "My photographs depict some of the rawest and youngest surfaces on Earth, allowing the viewer to imagine the prehistoric beginnings of the landscape, void of any human presence or history."Ultima Thule was part funded by The National Lottery through Arts Council England and The University of Plymouth.
http://www.impressions-gallery.com/exhibitions/exhibition.php?id=13

I think this project has informed his next projects, surrounding earthquakes and Tsunami's in Japan:

Ultima Thule
Stephen Vaughan's work explores the connections between geology, archaeology, history, and memory. In Ultima Thule, the persistent human urge to explore unknown territory is considered within the context of complex geological processes, over vast periods of time, and the formation of the Earth itself.  The potential for discovery or transformation from beneath the surface or beyond the threshold is a central theme in much of  Vaughan’s work. His photographs are concerned, on one level, with the scrutiny of natural phenomena and, on another level, with the landscape as a site of encounter and revelation.

Ultima Thule was initially inspired by the exploratory voyage of Pytheas, in 325 BC, from the Greek colonies of the Mediterranean to the far north Atlantic, beyond the edges of the known world.  Vaughan's photographs were made in Iceland, which is thought to be the location of Pytheas' Thule. His images of volcanic fissures, shifting tectonic plates, vast glaciers and steaming, sulphurous pools, also connect Pytheas' ancient voyage of discovery to contemporary inter-planetary exploration.  They describe landscapes that are the nearest equivalent on Earth to the surfaces of the Moon and Mars, including sites that were used by Apollo astronauts for field training before the first Moon landing.

Ultima Thule is a study of some of the rawest and youngest surfaces on Earth.  Vaughan's photographs retreat in time to the imagined primordial beginnings of landscape and the formation of the Earth itself, void of any human presence or history.

A Catfish Sleeps
In 18th century Japan, the belief emerged that the Shinto deity Kashima held a foundation stone (kamame-ishi) upon the head of a giant catfish (Namazu), thus protecting the population from the terrors of earthquake when the catfish stirred. Drawings of the Namazu showed it as an ominous threat before the great 1855 earthquake, but also as a source of redistributed wealth for post-catastrophe developers and craftsmen. The photographs in A Catfish Sleeps have been made with this metaphor in mind.

The images record a journey that corresponds with significant points on the tectonic map, where the Eurasian, Pacific, Philippine and Okhotsk plates meet in a complex subduction zone that moves beneath the landscape of Japan and the seismically threatened metropolis of Tokyo. The relatively new science of plate tectonics provides a heightened awareness of the dangers caused by movements in the earth’s crust. In Japan, the complexities of the underlying geology are apparent in the form of numerous active volcanoes and the ever-present threat of major earthquakes. Nevertheless, civilisation pushes forward relentlessly above the geology. Human efforts to mitigate disaster and to control the forces of earthquake, eruption and tsunami are evident. Yet nature in its rawest state remains a focus for pilgrimage, fear and spectacle.

http://www.stephenvaughan.co.uk/Statement.html

A Catfish Sleeps explores the environmental and also the personal effects of natural disasters.

In 2011 he went to carry on the project about an earthquake that had happened in around 1700 in Japan, which is what the first part of A Catfish Sleeps is surrounding. While he was there a massive earthquake arrived, which caused him to photograph his new surroundings, it turned a historical legend into a real life event happening in the present.

There is a connection between the historical nature of his photographs and the personal nature, it isn't just an environmental project with the photographs of the people to tell the story, he is involved in it too, and these photographs are his story. 

I wonder how Edward Burtynsky would photograph these scenes, probably, build a scaffolding to lift him above the scene, and the photograph would have something more vivid about it