Impressive computer still lifes
A golden frame, streaked with veins of light, streaming from metal heads towards a red, square, woven, center piece. Small golden squares with round discs of the same color, lined up along white slotted lines before a black background – abstract minimalism á la Mark Rothko? The award-winning American photographer Mark Richards captures the beauty he discovered in old-fashioned tabulators, large computer systems, and cast-off computer models of his still lifes. He photographed them over the course of three months in the Computer History Museum in Silicon Valley, the heartland of the American electronic and computer industry.
He was fascinated with the organic forms of the machines: bundles of red and blue veins like out of old anatomical studies or extraterrestrial machine-creatures from science fiction films. For Richards, his works illustrate the human-machine relationship of the past: “I hope that the pictures reveal the human elements in machines and the mechanical elements in humans.” According to him, the invention of the computer represents a milestone in history similar to that of Gutenberg’s printing press.
In the history of photographs of industrial sites, Mark Richards forges a new path. His work is in contrast to the dark, towering chimneys and threatening dams of Margaret Bourke-White or the clinical documentation of car production in the Ford factories of Charles Sheeler from the 1930s and 1940s, with their mystifying distance between technology and viewer. Richards presents intimate portraits that remove the dark aura from technology. The result is an important piece of industrial history and enlightening insights on the aesthetics of machines, which can also be found in the 2007 illustrated book Core Memory: A Visual Survey of Vintage Computers.
Geraldine Blum
| 1978 - 1983 | Studies at the San Francisco State University, San Francisco, USA |
| Since 1983 | Photojournalist e.g. for the The Times, New Yorker Times, News Week, Life |
| 2005 - 2010 | Worked for the project CORE MEMORY, at the Computer History Museum About the history of the computer |
| Lies and works in California, USA |
| Award | |
1990 - 2008 | Communication Arts Magazine Photography Annual Award of Excellence (1990, 1991, 1992, 1994, 1996 , 1997,1998, 2000, 2001,2003,2005,2008) |
| 1986 | Society of Newspaper Design Award of Excellence Photojournalism Portolio |
| 1986 | National Press Photographers Association Pictures of the Year Award of Excellence |
| Silver Lake Partners, USA | |
Exhibits (Selection)
| Exhibitions | |
| 2010 - 2011 | Mill Valley Public Library, Mill Valley, CA, USA |
| 2007 - 2010 | Computer History Museum, Mountain View, CA, USA |
| 2009 | Phoenix Airport Museum, Phoenix, Arizona, USA |
| Palo Alto Research Center, Palo Alto, CA, USA | |
| 2008 | Etherton Gallery, Tucson, Arizona, USA |
| San Jose Art Museum, San Jose, CA, USA | |
| Junku-do Shoten Book Store, Tokio, Japan |
Books/Catalogs (Selection)
| 2007 | Core Memory, Chronicle books |
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