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Photograph - Bated Breath: Fluff and Dust from the Whispering Gallery, St. Paul's Cathedral, London, 1997

Bated Breath: Fluff and Dust from the Whispering Gallery, St. Paul's Cathedral, London, 1997

  • Object:

    Photograph

  • Place of origin:

    London, England (made)

  • Date:

    1997 (made)

  • Artist/Maker:

    Parker, Cornelia, born 1956 (photographer)

  • Materials and Techniques:

    Photogram

  • Museum number:

    E.490-1998

  • Gallery location:

    In Storage

  • Image unavailable

Cornelia Parker is a London-based artist who works in sculpture, installation and photography. In this piece, Bated Breath: Fluff and Dust Collected from the Whispering Gallery, St. Paul's Cathedral, London, the artist has tried to capture the atmosphere within the Cathedral. As she herself describes, 'I focused on the felted layer of dust that had collected on the edges of the parapet. This dust formed an accumulated acoustic, built up over time by the thousands of whispering visitors. Later, trapped between the glass, the fluff and dust was used as a negative to produce a photogram'.

A photogram is a photograph made without a camera or a lens by placing an object or objects on top of a piece of paper or film coated with light-sensitive materials and then exposing the paper or film to light. Where the object covers the paper, the paper remains unexposed and light in tone; where it does not cover, the paper darkens. If the object is translucent, midtones appear. After exposure the paper is developed and fixed.

Physical description

Black and white photogram of fluff and dust collected from the Whispering Gallery, St Pauls Cathedral, London.

Place of Origin

London, England (made)

Date

1997 (made)

Artist/maker

Parker, Cornelia, born 1956 (photographer)

Materials and Techniques

Photogram

Dimensions

Height: 62.5 cm frame, Width: 62.5 cm frame, Height: 29 cm print, Width: 29 cm print

Object history note

Gelatin-silver print (Photogram) by Cornelia Parker (born Gloucestershire, 4 July 1956)

Historical significance: The photogram process which Parker has used for this piece, placing the fluff and dust directly onto the photographic paper, has its precedents in the earliest paper photography. The process was famously re-interpreted by photographers such as Man Ray and Moholy-Nagy.

Descriptive line

Parker, Corneila. 'Bated Breath: Fluff and Dust Collected from the Whispering Gallery, St. Paul's Cathedral, London', 1997.

Exhibition History

Silver & Syrup: Selections from the History of Photography (Victoria and Albert Museum 26/11/1998-31/08/1999)

Labels and date

Cornelia Parker (British, born 1956)
Bated Breath: Fluff and Dust from the Whispering Gallery, St. Pauls' Cathedral, London. 1997
Gelatin-silver print
Bought 1998
E.490-1998

"I was on my hands and knees in the hushed gallery, trying to cope with my fear of heights, when I focused on the felted layer of dust that had collected on the edges of the parapet. This dust formed an accumulated acoustic, built up over time by the thousands of whispering visitors. Later, trapped between the glass, the fluff and dust was used as a negative to produce a photogram."

Cornelia Parker, 1998

Materials

Photographic paper

Techniques

Gelatin silver process

Subjects depicted

London; St Paul's Cathedral; Dust; Photogram

Categories

Photographs

Collection code

PDP

Qr_O84233
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