Following a hiatus after an arson attack on his studio, destroying all of his life’s work. Red Saunders returned to photography around the year 2000. He began to explore digital photography and emphasized his profession in completing personal work.
The above image depicts the events of the English Civil War in 1647. The image consists of multiple images seamlessly stitched together digitally to create a painterly documentation of the events that happened during that time. The advantage of stitching the images together was that he was able to achieve lighting that would otherwise be impossible. It also allowed him to direct a smaller group of people at a time as if he was to direct all of these actors to shoot this single image it would be impossible to get them all to do exactly what he wants them to do.
On Red Saunder’s website, he talks about the setting of this image and the importance of the event that the image is documenting. He writes:
“The English Revolution / English Civil War (1640 to 1660) overthrew the monarchy of Charles I. The Levellers were one of the larger groups and movements that worked for an extension of the franchise, religious tolerance, an elected judiciary and many other reforms. This image is inspired by an account of a meeting of Levellers with supporters of Oliver Cromwell’s New Model Army at an encampment near Malton in North Yorkshire. Taking advantage of the revolution’s temporary assault on patriarchal authority, women claimed the right to be heard. This was an act of political and physical bravery in which they risked torture and execution. Meetings like these took place throughout England in 1647 to debate the direction of the revolution.” (Saunders, 2016)
References
Saunders, R. (2016). RED Saunders. [online] Redsaundersphoto.eu. Available at: http://www.redsaundersphoto.eu/bio.html [Accessed 7 Oct. 2016].
Coulton, J. (2016). Manchester photography: Red Saunders’ digital “tableaux” of a political past. [online] Creative Tourist. Available at: https://www.creativetourist.com/articles/museums/manchester/manchester-photography-red-saunders-digital-tableaux-of-a-political-past/ [Accessed 7 Oct. 2016].
Saunders, R. (2016). RED Saunders. [online] Redsaundersphoto.eu. Available at: http://www.redsaundersphoto.eu/1647.html [Accessed 7 Oct. 2016].
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