Costa Rica: A Photographer's View

In August 2014 I spent a fortnight in Costa Rica with my partner Helen, as part of a group on an organised “Exodus” trip. Costa Rica is very much a place to visit for tourists interested in its incredibly rich and diverse wildlife and environment, although it also offers excellent surfing and sun-soaked Pacific beaches. However, as befits a country with tropical rainforests the weather can be extremely wet! Whilst I was strictly on holiday I did, of course, record (where possible) the wildlife that we saw and, in the light of the “why feed the birds” subject of my major project, I was particularly interested in recording the Costa Ricans’ use of bird feeders to attract (mainly, but not exclusively) hummingbirds. During our fortnight I took 3300 photographs, ultimately keeping around 1000 as a photographic record of our visit. The following is a very brief commentary on our adventures.

Red-eyed Tree Frog, Manuel Antonio NP

The People

I’ve never been to an “exotic” country before where the people treated me as “part of the scenery”. They are not rude (quite the opposite), but they are presumably so used to seeing tourists that we don’t register as being unusual in any way. This was quite a revelation on the holiday. I also felt completely safe everywhere I went, although there is a small amount of petty crime at some of the major destinations. The Costa Ricans are clearly peace-loving people (they don’t have an army and have largely escaped the [civil] wars, which have recently affected some of their neighbours, unscathed).

The Landscape

Costa Rica has volcanoes and mountains reaching almost 4000 metres. But it also borders both the Caribbean and the Pacific oceans. The high rainfall (particularly in the east and in the mountain regions) produces lush vegetation (no deserts here!), which carpets large tracts of land and virtually all the mountain regions. As a consequence the landscape can start to look rather “samey” after a while: there are few exposed rocks or lone trees. This is not ideal habitat for landscape photographers! Upland areas are often hidden in a layer of cloud or mist, which can produce some atmospheric effects if you are happy to put up with a visibility of 10 – 50 metres. The limited numbers of landscape scenes that I photographed whilst in Costa Rica were mainly produced as representative images of what it was like to be there, rather than for their artistic or aesthetic qualities.

The Wildlife

Now you’re talking! Costa Rica has an incredibly rich, diverse and (importantly) colourful wildlife. It is possible to get close to monkeys, sloths, birds, snakes, frogs, spiders, crabs, butterflies and dragonflies. Not to mention all the orchids and other plant life. You name it, Costa Rica has it! With the exception of its secretive “big cats” (Puma, Ocelot and Jaguar), it is possible to find and take decent photographs of pretty much anything. The diversity of species reflects the diversity of habitats, so animals that are common at sea level may not occur up in the mountains and vice-versa.

Male Resplendent Quetzel

So is Costa Rica the wildlife photographer’s dream? Well, not completely. For a start it rains heavily throughout the year and particularly in the summer and early autumn months (i.e. when we visited!). This causes problems with water getting into the camera lens (as happened to me on more than one occasion) and steaming up: good waterproofing of your equipment is strongly recommended! Also, much of the wildlife is found in and around forested areas, which are shady at the best of times and particularly when the weather is overcast and/or wet. Consequently you have to rely on the subject being static or, if it is moving, using a high to very high ISO setting (say 1000+) to capture the action without blurring. I mainly used my Nikon D7000 camera in these conditions. The camera has many qualities, but does exhibit some graininess at higher ISO settings. My images would not print up well if taken under these circumstances.

A second problem was evident when we made a nocturnal visit to watch green turtles laying eggs on a Caribbean beach at Tortuguero. Strictly no photography! This rule is essential, because taking photographs may disturb the endangered turtles and cause them to abort laying, but watching the huge female turtles emerging from the sea, digging holes, laying eggs and then covering them with sand was an amazing “once in a lifetime” experience, which would have produced a dream photographic sequence….

The Hummingbirds

During the first part of the holiday hummingbirds were in short supply. However, we had the opportunity in Monteverde National Park to visit a “hummingbird garden”, equipped with sugar feeders, where several species of hummingbird were zooming around, sometimes within a few inches of our faces. What an amazing experience, and definitely one of the highlights of the trip! However, we only had limited time and the light was very poor (overcast with light rain in a forest clearing), so I had to settle for some static images of various species, taken at high ISO values. Fortunately the final lodge we visited, in Savegre National Park, had several (mainly hummingbird) feeders and attracted good numbers of three main montane species (we were situated at 2200 metres altitude). The staff had gone to some lengths to provide natural perches for them and I was finally able, on the penultimate day of the holiday, to get some decent photographs of the hummingbirds at rest. The commonest (and most photogenic) species was the Green Violet-ear: I took over 100 photographs of this bird, one of which is shown below.

Green Violet-ear, Savegre NP

Photographing the hummingbirds hovering and feeding on nectar proved challenging, even though they kept their bodies still during the process. My favourite portraits were all of static birds.

Do the hummingbird feeding stations in Costa Rica provide any insights for my project work? The feeders are easy to set up and common throughout the Americas, obviously benefit the birds and provide pleasure for tourists and locals alike. Monitoring birds coming to feeders provides useful information for conservationists and there is commercial gain for the manufacturers and lodge/hotel owners (the latter would attract fewer visitors if they did not provide feeders in areas where hummingbirds can be attracted). The provision of “natural” perching posts close to the feeders encourages wildlife photographers. Unfortunately we don’t have hummingbirds in the UK, but many of the reasons for feeding the birds in Costa Rica are equivalent to our own. Perhaps the biggest gain of all would be the personal pleasure gained by the private home owner or tenant, in the UK or overseas, who can get close to the birds and enjoy watching their activity by providing them with the food that they need.

Exhibition Visit and Walking Reading Group Review: "Dalston Anatomy"

(Photographers' Gallery and Ramillies Street to Ridley Road Market, Dalston: 30 August 2014)

The Exhibition

“Dalston Anatomy” is a colourful, varied celebration of Dalston’s Ridley Road market, created and produced by London based Italian artist and photographer Lorenzo Vitturi. Over several years Vitturi integrated himself within the vibrant Ridley Road community market scene, photographing local characters, collecting discarded fruit and vegetables and buying materials such as paints, dyes and chalk which, together, he would use to create makeshift sculptures and installations. These would then be photographed. The photographs were incorporated into a photo-book, “Dalston Anatomy”, published in 2013 to critical acclaim.

The exhibition incorporates many of these photographs together with sculptures and installations which, in a departure from “normal” photographic exhibitions, cover much of the floor space in the top gallery.

The Walk

The “Walking Reading Group” is an experimental group, set up by London-based Artists Lydia Ashman, Ania Bas and Simone Mair. The group meets on an irregular basis (booking required, to ensure things don’t get out of hand) to discuss themes arising from exhibitions and related texts, which are emailed to participants beforehand.

Exhibition Review

Two things struck me when I walked into the exhibition room. Firstly, the floor space was used to incorporate colourful installations, including some of Vitturi’s sculptures and a prominent poem by Sam Berkson, formed of fragments of conversation overheard at the market, which is written in large print on a mat on the floor (Image 1).

Image 1: Exhibition Layout

Secondly, bright and vibrant colours are everywhere. Countless varieties of bright fruit and vegetables (we didn’t recognise them all) form components of the photographic prints and sculptures (the latter use artificial replacements for the organic items). The prints (thinly) populate the walls, but can also be found on and around the central installation. Complementary colours in some prints mix with rainbow effects in others. Only one print (showing five artistically arranged bananas) is partially drained of colour, for reasons best known to the artist. Somehow, the subtlety of this print attracted me to take a closer examination: perhaps the image represents the peace that falls on the market at night, following the vibrancy of the day’s activities.

The artist is quoted as saying that “I wanted to capture Ridley Road market’s edgy dynamic”. Many photographers would have contented themselves with taking portraits of stall holders and purchasers, discarded food, transactions taking place, the setting up and the aftermath. Vitturi’s novel use of found objects as well as items bought at the market in order to create and then photograph art represents a new approach to celebrating his subject. However, does it take us too far from the market’s roots? A few street scenes are represented, but they seem incongruous, even out of place amongst his fruit and vegetable sculptures. Focusing on the latter means that we are now a further step away from the market and I found it difficult to visualise or warm to an event that was actually occurring as I toured the gallery. Which brings us to the walk….

Walk Review

Armed with material to use during the walk (well, at least a tour of the exhibition and a half hour browse of the varied texts) I joined up with around 20 other individuals and the walk leaders for a 4.5 mile walk from the Photographers' Gallery to (of course) Ridley Road market. After introducing themselves the walk leaders asked us to think up and write down some “key words” relating to the exhibition and texts on sheets of paper. We were then asked to pair up with someone whom we did not know, whose key words related in some ways to our own. After the initial chaos we set off on the walk, chatting with our new companions about the exhibition, the texts and pretty much anything else that came to mind. Roughly every 20 minutes we swapped partners, so that by the end of the walk (yes, we all reached the market) we had walked with five different people. During the middle section of the walk we were asked to walk silently, which meant that I learnt little from my third partner (and vice versa), although at least my throat got a “breather”. After discussing the exhibition (others had similar views to my own), my gambit of mentioning how much I disagreed with the author of one of the texts who stated (in so many words) that pioneering photographers such as Walker Evans, who photographed poor families in the depression era, exploited their subjects, started to wear thin. In the end the discussions veered more towards finding out about my new companions and rather less towards criticising the exhibition and texts. After spending over four hours at the Photographers’ Gallery and on the walk, my partner and I said our farewells and left most of the group to continue their conversation at a Ridley Road hostelry.

Conclusions

Exhibitions inevitably reveal some of the personality of the artist. Whether the viewer buys into the subject matter of the exhibition will depend to some extent on how well their personality is matched to that of the artist. In this case I struggled to find a reason why this exhibition might be greater than or even equal to the sum of its parts. Yes, I enjoyed the vibrancy of the colours. I also appreciated that the artist was trying to do something different, as was the Photographers’ Gallery in allowing photographs and other art to be portrayed as an installation. However, the lack of a clear theme and the lack of empathy that I felt with the market itself as a result of looking at these photographs did not align me with the artist’s aims. This feeling was shared by some of my walking companions.

I have to admit that I was dragged along rather reluctantly by my partner to the walk. However, I was pleasantly surprised: I found it uplifting to chat with people, often half my age or younger, with whom I had something in common, even if at the end of the walk I hadn’t gained a great insight into the works of the artists and writers that had been studied. Seeing issues from a different point of view was refreshing: I can imagine something similar (without the walking) working well at parties and I’m sure that friendships will be struck up by people who have attended these events. At the time of writing it is not clear whether Walking Reading Group events will continue. If not, it was certainly a worthwhile experiment.

Assignment 3: Critical Essay. Tutor Feedback and Final Comments

In the critical essay I commented on the role of the genre of wildlife photography (current, past and possibly future) and attempted to answer the following questions:

•         What are its values?
•      What is its current status?
•          Why is it largely ignored by the photographic art establishment?
•          In contrast, why is the genre of landscape photography (with which it has much in common) greeted by the photographic art establishment with far greater critical appreciation?
•          Is it possible to bridge the perceived gap between wildlife photography and photographic art in the future?
•          What benefits can the traditional “figurative” values of the genre bring?

By the time I had finished the essay I was satisfied that I had at least had a go at answering these questions and had painted an objective (although admittedly broad brush) picture of the genre of wildlife photography and its links with other genres, as well as looking at some possible future directions for the genre.

My tutor was not so happy, feeling in particular that the title of the essay (“Understanding the genre of wildlife photography: what are its values and is it art?”) was too broad (in retrospect I agree with this) and didn’t allow me to get to the heart of the topic. He noted that the document “has a good deal of interest relative to your study area” and that “you have made a good effort in the review and to develop your knowledge and understanding for the major project work”. However, “there is a limited amount of knowledge gained from this research piece in terms of how you can move your own work forward”. In his response he highlighted two areas that might, in their own right, have provided narrower subject areas for an essay. These are highlighted in points 1 and 2 below:

1.       “How does aesthetic appeal grow into pleasurable feeling for a viewer? Why or how can a documentary photograph evoke ethos, empathy or sympathy – considered or emotional reactions?” and:

2.       “What do wildlife artists add to their work that photographers may not understand and/or use?” Comparing and contrasting the work of a number of wildlife artists with known photographers of similar subjects would have allowed me to “categorise the elements involved” (in looking at the artists’ work as art) and perhaps identify a way forward for photographers who also wish their work to be considered as art.

Both areas are, as my tutor pointed out, pertinent and very relevant to my major project work and will be of value to me in plotting a way forward. They could have made good subjects for a separate essay. Nevertheless, the subject matter for the critical review had been agreed with my tutor beforehand and there is no way that I could have incorporated the issues raised by these points (assuming that I had thought of them!) into the planned essay without expanding it well beyond 3000 words.

In the essay I reviewed the work of Daniel Beltrá, a photojournalist who carries out assignment work for Greenpeace, within the context of showing that photojournalism can, in the right hands, amalgamate the genres of wildlife and documentary photography. My tutor commented that “you review his work well” but: “He is a photojournalist. He isn’t a wildlife photographer”. I disagree with this statement. Beltrá is both a photojournalist (by profession) and a wildlife photographer. More importantly, he cares for the environment and publicises the way that we are destroying the environment by the use of abstract, “artistic” images that have great aesthetic appeal and therefore attract a wide audience, publicity and a public reaction that just may bring to the fore environmentalists of the future. These, in turn, might even prevent the loss of all our wildlife. I removed a number of strong and/or controversial statements from the final draft of the essay but left one in. Referring to the (potential) influence of wildlife photographers it reads as follows: “…. and they need to be influential, because the damage we are causing to the environment may ultimately lead to the genre of wildlife photography disappearing altogether, as there will be no wildlife left to photograph”. This statement ties in strongly with the first and last questions posed in my introduction, above. The use of photojournalism to bind wildlife and documentary photography together, the use of the image of oiled pelicans (is this not a wildlife photograph?) and the popularity of images of threatened species (“take a look at this portrait of a tiger in the wild, because you will have to go to a zoo to see them in the future”) point to current and future values for wildlife photography, both “figurative” and “artistic”.

My tutor made the points that I did not provide names when talking about the world of photographic art (this was quite deliberate and also applied to my discussion of the world of the wildlife photographer) and that I provided no statistics in the review (the example he quoted was that when Kodak made film only 5% of the output was provided for the professional market [I’m surprised that the figure wasn’t lower!]). Point taken, but I didn’t feel it was necessary to quote statistics to make my points. Perhaps I was wrong.

When talking about landscape photography and the “New Topographical” conceptual examination of existence, rather than the figurative value of this work, my tutor comments that “the work and its derivatives have intrinsic aesthetic values. Those you should have examined, identified and discussed”. This is a good point and relates back to point 1 above. My research led me in some interesting directions and I used “New Topographics” to highlight how new concepts and ideas within the boundaries of the landscape photography genre led to its acceptance as photographic art. I bought the book of the original “New Topographics” exhibition and studied the photographs, but was unable to understand why the featured work was held in such high regard; only that it represented an important breakaway from the purely figurative values of previous work and that it was acclaimed by the artistic community. To understand the aesthetic appeal of this work will be to understand the general appeal of photographic art and its underlying conceptual approach. My tutor warned me that this might take me several years: I’m not there yet.

In conclusion, to fully answer the questions raised in the title and introductory pages of my essay I would have had to have written a far longer essay: perhaps one or more chapters in a book! Nevertheless I feel that I have raised most of the key issues and have done so objectively. Whilst admitting to being a wildlife photographer I have not “taken sides” on any of the issues. As a consequence my conclusions are unsurprising and, although I have been able to find little common ground between the world of photographic art and the world of the wildlife photographer, I believe that I have put forward a strong case for wildlife photography being regarded as an important and influential genre, both now and in the future.