Biography

Discussion

From 1976 to 1981, Anja de Jong studied at the ABK (Academie van Beeldende Kunsten, ‘Academy of Fine Arts’) in Rotterdam in the study programme ‘Illustration and Photography’. Reflecting on this period, De Jong has said that the courses ‘platte vormstudie’ (‘planar form study’), taught by Marc Terstroet, and ‘ruimtelijke vormstudie’ (‘spatial form study’), taught by Kees Verschuren, were of great importance to her. During these classes, her ideas evolved concerning the dynamic relationship between planar and spatial design that was to influence her work for a long period of time. In 1981, De Jong completed her study with a project in which she photographed paper for the company ‘Proost en Brand’ in a space designed by the architect Wim Quist on the Berenplaat.

After graduating, De Jong began working as a freelance photographer, introducing a sharp distinction between her autonomous work and her photography done on assignment. Her work can be classified into three groups: architectural interpretations, still lifes, and landscapes. All share one important characteristic, i.e. there are no people appearing in any of her photos.

Even though Anja de Jong is seen as one of the best architectural photographers in the Netherlands, one may nevertheless question whether the work with which she achieved this renown can be rightfully viewed as architectural photography. Her photos are not of facades, stairways or kitchens; it is not her aim to photograph the function and location of architecture. De Jong analyses the visual qualities of photography in terms of form, lines and the play of light, with the construction and form of architectural spaces taken as her starting point. At the same time, her work is an analysis of the act of observation. A play of lines, surfaces and shadows emphasises the planar two-dimensional character of the image, followed directly, however, by an illusion of depth and three-dimensionality. This approach results in photos in which the interpretation of architecture is more important than the recognisability of the buildings.

Sometimes one encounters only a minimum of architectural information in De Jong’s photos: the play of lines that creates an intersection of surfaces, as well as the various nuances of white, can then become the subject of a shot. Through subtle differences in tone, spatial forms are analysed and abstracted. De Jong is not so much intrigued by details in the architectural space, but rather the effects of space, lighting and shadow. The curators of the exhibition Images et Imaginaires d’Architecture (‘Architectural Images and Illusions’), held at the Centre Pompidou in Paris in 1984, selected De Jong’s photos as examples of an abstract, representational vision of architecture.

De Jong’s work in this early period is comparable to that of the American photographer Judith Turner, who photographed the white, geometric architecture of the ‘New York Five’ (including Eisenman and Meyer). In Turner’s work as well, the photos are not taken to highlight the architecture. Instead, the architecture serves as source material for compositions that tend towards abstraction. Architects, in turn, often experience both De Jong’s and Turner’s compositions as an inspiration.

Around 1987, one can observe a certain shift in De Jong’s approach to photographing architecture taking place. At this time, she photographed several examples of civil-technical and industrial architecture, such as the former Gare d’Orsay (the Musée d’Orsay) in Paris and a water treatment facility for the district ‘Rijn­–Kennemerland’ (WRK. III). While the play of light and shadow were still important, De Jong devoted less attention to the nuances of white. She allowed more grey tints, which were sometimes contrasted with a heavy black. The recognisability of the space, the location, and the placement of objects within the space, all came to play a greater role. In other words, De Jong’s photography of architecture began to appear more realistic, more documentary, when compared to those taken during her more abstract early period. The fascination with themes such as space, light and time in the context of photography, however, remained. The emphasis was still on straight lines, surfaces and shadows.

In the shots that De Jong took in the exhibition building of the Mesdag Panorama in The Hague, round forms began to play a prominent role in her compositions for the first time. Only later, in her landscapes, are these round forms encountered again.

Through the shift in her approach to architecture, the work that De Jong did autonomously and that which she produced on assignment became more similar. In her commissioned work, recognisability had always been more explicit than in her purely abstract shots in white. When, in 1988 and 1989, De Jong photographed objects in museums in Amsterdam and Leiden on assignment, her approach to these shots was scarcely indistinguishable from the photos that she had taken as an autonomous photographer in the Royal Museum of the Armed Forces and Military History in Brussels. When it came to commissioned work, De Jong indeed spent more time photographing the collections, providing her with access to museum depots in attics and basements. With the images that were taken in the exhibition spaces, the objects were related to the space in which they were hanging, standing or resting. De Jong sometimes toyed with format and proportion in the process, creating a kind of disorientation.

To get a better understanding of the representation of space, De Jong investigated the theme of ‘space versus surface’ in 1983, using self-made constructions with artificial lighting.

In this self-created ‘architecture’, spatial constructions are formed from opaque and transparent triangles, squares, and trapezoids. In the resulting series of photos, which De Jong refers to as Constructies (‘Constructions’), architecture is, as it were, abstracted. Through camera angle and lighting, the spatial white and black forms, along with their grey shadows, no longer retain their three-dimensionality. What remains are two-dimensional compositions, comprised of the distribution of surfaces and the play of lines. In these compositions, white predominates. The confusing relationship between the effects of depth and surface distribution highlighted the ontological possibilities obtainable through photography. After all, through the illusory effect of perspective it seems as if we sometimes forget that, in photography, forms are always reduced to two dimensions.

After this spatial investigation, De Jong put her new insights into practice in a series of architectural shots taken during a trip abroad to cities such as Basel, Bologna and Barcelona. Through this examination of space and surface distribution, these photos led to a new vision of architecture.

In 1985, De Jong once again turned to the relationship between composition and ordinance in a series of still lifes that she referred to as Composities (‘Compositions’). Just as with the series Constructies, she experimented indoors—introducing changing camera angles and various lighting situations—with the illusionism of photography.

Small everyday (utilitarian) objects—bolts, steel wire, balls of wool, spools of thread, matches, stones, pins, or a pair of glasses—are placed on a white surface. By lighting these elements in a way that shadows are eliminated and a high contrast is created between black and white, compositions emerge that are almost graphic in nature, i.e. as if trading in her camera for a pencil. The shots are characterised by a dynamic two-dimensional partitioning of the surface, which leads to a spatial experience only upon taking a second glance. Once, however, the forms are recognised as spatial dimensions, they appear—because of the special angle from which they are photographed—to be in conflict with gravity. Because these still lifes originated from architectonic constructions that De Jong created herself, this work has been associated with staged photography, a movement that was highly prominent in the Netherlands during this period. While one could very well profess a similarity based on her object-based orientation, De Jong’s still lifes are more academic studies intended to investigate a stated visual problem rather than scenes designed to create a new reality. These two interludes—during which De Jong researched the visual qualities of photography through still lifes that she constructed herself—definitely had repercussions for her approach to photographing of architecture.

At the time, De Jong’s architectural photography had become less abstract, in about 1987, exteriors and landscapes reluctantly began to emerge. In the series Panorama Mesdag of 1988, such a ‘faux terrain’ (‘illusionary world’)—with its specific ordering—already came to play a modest role. Later, in 1990, landscape and the exterior were assigned a much more prominent role when De Jong photographed the former broadcasting station ‘Radio Kootwijk’. It would take more than a year for landscape to displace architecture from its long-standing position. In the spring of 1992, De Jong began with the first phase of a major project, Borderland. In this project, De Jong wishes to document the tense dynamic that occurs between the raw, unkempt nature and landscapes (the ‘cultural landscape’) that are shaped by humanity.

By producing a visual document, De Jong hopes to draw attention to the vulnerability of a seemingly untouched nature in high-altitude regions, ranging from cold to extreme cold, and in rainforest environments, ranging from hot to extreme hot.

She seeks to find this dynamic in areas of transition: that no-man’s-land, where traces of human interaction with nature are found in the limitless space of the natural landscape.

In terms of style and theme, the photos form the project form a unity, although for each location, of course, the relationship between the natural and the cultural landscape is unique. Each observed area of transition manifests itself per region—through the differences in the natural environments as well as the kind of human intervention—entirely in its own way.

Iceland was the first target of Borderland, because it represents a region of coldness, where people are able to live and work on a permanent basis, but is also representative of a country with its own culture. The landscape is rough and deserted, without trees. With its overwhelmingly large scale, it is experienced as threatening and disarming. The insubstantiality of humanity in such desolate regions can be felt when, while examining a photo, one suddenly sees the two miniscule radar stations on the horizon of an expansive and abandoned area; while in another photo, the same stations appear as enormous reflecting watchmen built at the foot of a mountain range. The ingredients for capturing the ‘borderland’ in Iceland at first seemed to be in ample abundance. It turned out, however, that the only true areas of transition between the natural and the cultural landscapes were to be found on the outskirts of the cities. The images that De Jong made in Iceland do not reveal a conscious choice for either one of the two landscapes. Sometimes nature, but sometimes human intervention in the landscape, predominates in these photos. These two approaches illustrate De Jong’s fascination and amazement when it comes to the delicate balance between culture and nature that the people of Iceland have managed to achieve.

Svalbard (Spitsbergen) was chosen as an example of a cold region. This initially uninhabited island has only a few liveable towns and temporary shelters, from which people work in the areas of coal mining and scientific research. When these mining locations are no longer in use, they are left behind in this barren and empty landscape as traces of human activity. It is these abandoned places that form areas of transition, where the boundary between nature and culture gradually shifts until the decline has done its definitive work. It seems that De Jong has made a more deliberate choice in Spitsbergen than in Iceland: human intervention in the landscape is the primary topic. She presents a monumental depiction of the station that measures air pollution and the remnants of the mines. She guides our glance along the most prominent elements in the photos, leading it to a barren and seemingly endless landscape. The drama these compositions radiate is intensified by the almost theatrical clouds and the special way in which the light falls.

De Jong extended her fascination for empty and desolate landscapes as well to two islands with regions found at higher elevations: La Palma (Canary Islands) and Hawaii. The boundary between the natural and cultural landscapes manifests itself differently at both of these locations. Just as with Iceland, La Palma features a barren, volcanic region. On top of the highest crater (2426 meters) in the Parque Nacional de Caldera de Taburiente, one finds a double transitional area: besides the ‘borderland’ that bridges nature and culture, here there is also, as it were, the boundary between earth and the universe. Here, in the middle of a natural landscape, a space observatory has been built (El Observatorio del Roque de los Muchachos). High above the clouds, undisturbed by conditions brought on by mist and air pollution, one can look out into space. Shots of this observatory show how what at first seems to be a major intrusion in the natural landscape is, ultimately, only a minor intervention when viewing the vastness of the landscape. In doing so, people are reminded of their insubstantiality in two ways: in relation to nature and in relation to the universe.

Several observatories are as well found on the island of Hawaii, on the mountain Mauna Kea. Here, however, the elevation is 4,205 meters. Just as with La Palma, the observatory domes appear merely as small disturbances of the natural order in this desolate, volcanic region. In spite of the infrastructure that has been built at this elevation, nature has not lost its predominance. As with most of the Borderland photos, there is virtually always some kind of architectural element present that figures as an echo of man’s intervention in nature. Traces of this are found everywhere in the landscape depicted in these Hawaiian photos. But here too the rule applies: though the photos clearly depict human intervention, nowhere does one encounter an actual living being.

Representing regions of extreme cold in this project is Antarctica. Those areas where people are no more than visitors: the scientist as investigator and the tourist as observer of the natural landscape. Because the Netherlands is one of the few countries belonging to the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR) that does not have its own scientific station on Antarctica, De Jong was obliged to rely completely on the permission of other countries, resulting in a delay of the preparation for her work. Climatological conditions and damage occurring during the actual trip as well created serious hindrances that frustrated her photographic work.

For many years, De Jong photographed in a square format using 6×6 cm Hasselblad negatives. She wishes to avoid making crops of these negatives, instead preferring to print the entire negative. While the square format is difficult to work with compositionally, De Jong still manages to create a dynamic distribution of tones and surfaces within these boundaries. She almost always works with a wide-angle lens. She prefers available light, except for her still lifes. In her early work, this light was meant to be diffused, in order to preserve a subtle contrast. When making prints in the darkroom, De Jong works very precisely in order to achieve the appropriate tonal scale, with the white in the photo actually approaching the white of the paper.

In the Borderland project, a remarkable break from De Jong’s earlier work occurs. Besides the thematic difference—i.e. a closed, interior space always organised by people versus the vast, unlimited exterior space found in the Borderland project—there is also a formal distinction: here she switches from the square format to an oblong format (on the basis of 4×5 inch Cambo negatives).

These two differences—theme and format—result in an entirely different compositional scheme, i.e. from closed compositions to extremely open compositions. In her landscapes, the horizon often lays at the halfway point. As such, the landscape itself, but also the sky and the light, are what significantly determines the photo. Light and the fall of light, which play such a prominent role in De Jong’s architectural photos, are therefore still very important elements in the Borderland photos. Here too, the relationships between light and dark, between form and counter-form, are investigated visually. A remark that De Jong made back in 1990 still applies: ‘What continues to intrigue me the most about photography, that you can suspend time and light within a space, and simply take the result home with you under your arm.’

The Borderland photos still preserve that typical De Jong quality: the stunning, cool light and the incomparable mastery of the tints. At the same time, the eye for detail and the authority that characterise her photography are just as discernable as before. Aesthetic, mood, and atmosphere are emphatically present.

Anja de Jong’s oeuvre is defined by its frugal, personal style. Her analytical and abstract interpretations of architecture, with images composed of white surfaces with occasional nuances of grey, are known to have inspired a number of epigones working in amateur circles during the 1980s.

In the field of professional photography, De Jong’s work is sometimes compared to that of Wijnanda de Roo: the architectural interior serves as the starting point for both photographers. At the same time, however, the differences are so marked that one can hardly speak of a mutual influence.

In terms of theme, De Jong’s landscapes are in line with descriptive landscape photography, which has been widely disseminated internationally in the wake of the exhibition New Topographics. Photographs of a Man-Altered Landscape, held in 1975. Since then, a concern for landscape and the urban environment has come to play a role landscape photography. With some, this concern is depicted in rhetorical fashion, using dramatic contrasts; with others, this occurs in a more neutral, almost careless manner.

What distinguishes Anja de Jong from other ‘descriptive’ photographers is that she does not question the landscape photography tradition. In terms of design, her work is representative of the more classical, romantic approach to the landscape. Without suggesting any direct influence, her photos give rise to associations with the work of Gustave Le Gray and Ansel Adams. De Jong’s preference for black and white and an interest in aesthetic qualities, e.g. light and dark contrasts and form versus counter-form, are signs of a completely personal idiom in contemporary landscape photography.

Documentation