Compartments are for train carriages ...

That's a quote from Paul Hill regarding the rather odd behaviour of lots of photographers who like to catergorise genres with endless sub divisions thrown in for good measure. In fact, the move away from this is already underway ... watch out for big changes at the RPS.

That said, here we are, going against the grain and trying to define what Abstract Photography is ... but ... we're not doing it for the sake of it ... we are attempting to define a brief so that we can all go and photographically explore the same area.

What is abstract photography? To define that, we also need to look at Minamilism and Surrealism.

Minimalist images have a very 'clean' look, there is a lack of detail, sometimes that can be because of the subject but also, it could be that the lack of detail in the highlights or shadows forces the viewer to look at the form ... in other words, there are very few distractions.

This image by Michael Kenna has recognisable elements that allow us to work out exactly what it is we are looking at.

Another good example of Michael's is his image of Copacabana Beach in Brazil.

We looked at the work of Matthieu Venot, particularly his Ground Loop series. He spends his time "focusing on the part rather than the whole, his photographs abstract his surroundings into colourful graphical vistas" ... and therein lies one of our first problems with definition ... is it abstract enough?

Certainly the images are 'abstracted', this view is one that we can never see with our own eyes, we have too much peripheral vision to focus tightly like this ... but ... that handrail gives us a visual clue as to what we are looking at. It gives the image an anchor in reality. As a group, we thought that images with an 'anchor' like this are more in the minamilist tradition ... again, with the caveat that we are looking at these images in order to form a definition for our project of shooting abstract photography.

We looked at the work of the Surrealists, at Philippe Halsman, oft sited as an American Photographer, he was actually born in Riga, then part of the USSR, a hotbed of of alternative photography.

This is Dali Atomicus ... it took twenty six attempts, after each one, the studio had to be mopped and dried, as did the cats. An early example of what Halsman called "jumpology" ...

Surrealism can be jocular, dreamlike, absurd, but generally rooted in reality. The thing it shares with minamilism is that "anchor".

As a group, we decided that the thing that sets abstract apart is that there is no frame of reference ... that anchor is completely missing.

Very popular amongst the members that were researching abstract photography was Frances Seward ... the write up here uses the word "surreal" and also mentions that dreamlike adjective we just talked about, but that missing anchor is what makes this image abstract. The lack of any visual reference allows you, the viewer, to see in it, whatever you like. You end up being part of the image by bringing all your own terms of reference, your own biases, to the party. You won't see exactly what your neighbour sees ... but you need to be careful when you title your image. If you tell us what it is, if you give us a verbal clue then you've given the image an anchor and all the mystery is lost.

We discussed lots of ways to create abstract images ... and we use the word 'image' quite deliberately as you don't need a camera to make one! Try using a photocopier and moving one of your prints around as it is being scanned to see what happens.

Other things to look at ...

No lens on the camera ...

Get a kaleidoscope effect with camera rotation ... or go a bit more analogue by making a vortoscope.

Barbara Kasten photographed the light coming through coloured perspex sheets but she has also experimented with cyanotypes, another cameraless form of image making.

We saw photographers shooting folded bits of paper, defocused light, refraction through glass ... the possibilities are as endless as the interpretations.

Experimentation is key as is no anchor in reality ...