Pushing The Boundaries of Photography & Film with Catherine Yass

Ceri interviews internationally acclaimed artist Catherine Yass, whose groundbreaking lens-based work pushes the boundaries of photography and film. The conversation explores her innovative techniques, including her distinctive method of layering negatives and positives, her relationship with architectural spaces, and her thoughts on time, failure, and resistance in art. This episode offers a fascinating glimpse into the mind of a Turner Prize nominee who continues to challenge conventional perspectives in contemporary art.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Catherine discovered her signature blue colour through mistakes while learning to use a 5x4 camera, leading her to deliberately overlay negative and positive images to challenge the idea that photographs must represent reality exactly as we see it.
• Her early experiences cycling around a deteriorating swimming pool in Tower Hamlets while watching Canary Wharf being built shaped her understanding of architectural power dynamics and social inequality in London.
• Catherine views her deliberately slow working process with cumbersome equipment as a form of resistance, noting how the industrial revolution transformed time into a commodity that must be used efficiently.
• For the NHS Swimmers, she asked healthcare workers to perform the same swimming movements twice, creating a temporal doubling that she felt was crucial to avoid the work looking like an advertisement in a public space.
• Through her High Wire project, Catherine came to value the importance of failure when the performer couldn't complete the walk, realising that sometimes dreams are more valuable than their achievement.
• Having started by photographing rhinoceros at the zoo, Catherine's fascination with weight, structure and gravity has remained consistent throughout her career, from early sculpture to recent film works.
• She maintains her artistic freedom by teaching just enough to fund her studio, allowing her to pursue projects without complete dependence on art sales, which she's found can fluctuate dramatically.
• Her transition from making physical interventions in architecture to photographing spaces emerged from the practical reality that installations are temporary, leading her to document them with photography which then became its own form.

BEST MOMENTS

"The camera is very big player in it... It's quite like a third character in the room with you before you even start making."

"I think through teaching you keep reading... there's a whole process of discussion and learning going on all the time, which is really rich."

"Freedom isn't freedom if it treads on somebody else's freedom. So you have to protect people's freedoms."

"I was interested in the idea of the subject not being whole, not being sort of complete or reliable or steady."

"Slowing things down can be quite a resistance... working with that big camera makes you work in a very organised way."

EPISODE RESOURCES

Guest Links:

https://www.catherineyass.co.uk/

Instagram @catherine.yass

PODCAST HOST BIO

With over 30 years in the art world, Ceri has worked closely with leading artists and arts professionals, managed public and private galleries and charities, and curated more than 250 exhibitions and events. She sold artworks to major museums and private collectors and commissioned thousands of works across diverse media, from renowned artists such as John Akomfrah, Pipilotti Rist, Rafael Lozano-Hemmer and Vito Acconci. Now, she wants to share her extensive knowledge with you, so you can excel and achieve your goals.

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