The Fine Art Animal: Amy Stein is in the House

Today’s bunny discussion switches from cats in advertisements and funny
studio portrait humping-bunnies to the fine art world, where many
serious photographers are utilizing animal imagery in their work. I’m
not just talking about the Jill Greenberg set, but rather, the folks
who make animal imagery that relates more directly to the human
experience. Just this past Friday, after mulling over cats in ads the
previous day, I awoke to my daily Flak Photo, and this is what i saw:

This is Sarah Small‘s Molly and EllyMay, and was included in the recent Humble Arts show.

Kismet?

Another image that has been making the rounds lately is this one, by Hannah Whitaker.

Amy
Stein was the one to alert me to this picture (which we both love), and also let me know
that the image will be on the cover of next month’s BlindSpot, which
marks a trend, if you ask me. I LOVE Amy’s work and blog, and asked her
to weigh in on this animal trend. What does it all mean, Amy?

I don’t think it’s a secret or a trend that we humans love our charismatic megafauna. Take a walk around your average office building and I bet you will find a goodly percentage of the employees marking their days
with a kitten or puppy wall calendar. If you want to move units of beer, tacos or personal liability insurance you are apparently best served by hiring a dog or duck to make your pitch. If
you want to grab the attention of 37-year-old photographer who writes a
blog and can’t stop talking about her very large cat, produce a photo
of a rabbit with a rainbow on his back.

Most fine art photographers
seem to have an animal shot in their portfolio. I think this has a lot
to do with the scattered nature of most photography portfolios and what
appears to be the standardized growth process of the modern
photographer. Many young photographers start off shooting photos of
their quirky friends and then move on to quirky objects. These quirky
objects tend to be things found in your average grandma’s bedroom, an
oddly placed taxidermied deer head or the neighbors pet. If these
photos run cute they will get passed around the Internet eliciting real
and ironic “ahhhs” and “ohhhs” from a populace raised on a steady diet
of Hello Kitty, Hamster Dance and Mr. Winkle.

In contrast there
has been a number of very mature and very excellent photos series where
animals are a critical part of their narrative. I am thinking of
Alessandra Sanguinetti, Simen Johan and Nicolai Howalt and Trine
Søndergaard. These photographers are exploring animal and human
relationships that run much deeper than our love of furry critters.
They are using animals not for the sake of using animals, but as a
means to examine various aspects of human behavior and motivation. I
like to think my Domesticated work stands in this company.

From Simen Johan’s Until the Kingdom Comes:

From Nicolai Howalt and Trine Søndergaard’s project How to Hunt:

And, of course, some imagery from the inimitable Amy Stein’s Domesticated series (here is an interesting interview about the making of this work::