Narrative

Narrative is a spoken or written account of connected events; a story. Simply narrative consists of a beginning, middle and end. However, a photographic narrative may not necessarily follow this structure, for instance it may simply imply what has past or suggest what could happen. By staging events and working with their subject matter in a similar way to that of a film director, artists creates tableaux in which narrative elements comes to the fore. Staged photography distils stories into one-off images, packed full of multi-layered information.

A narrative does not need to work in a linear sense. It can be cyclical, or be contained within one image or make cross references that, when brought together, inform the viewer’s overall understanding or interpretation of the photographer’s intentions.

Tableau and tableau vivant

Both are heavily influenced by painting. A tableau vivant is a French phrase meaning “living picture.” The term describes a group of suitably costumed actors or artist's models, carefully posed and often theatrically lit. They usually portray famous scenes or events.

One of the most famous examples is Ophelia by Sir John Everett Millais. The scene depicted is from Shakespeare's Hamlet, Act IV, Scene vii, in which Ophelia, driven out of her mind when her father is murdered by her lover Hamlet, drowns herself in a stream.

Victorian photographer Julia Margaret Cameron turned to popular poems and literature and re-enacted them photographically in elaborate ‘tableaux vivants’. In 1874, the writer Alfred Lord Tennyson asked his friend and neighbour from the Isle of Wight, Julia Margaret Cameron, to illustrate one of his works with her photographs. The work was The Idylls of the King, a collection of epic poems inspired by the Arthurian legends.

Julia Margaret Cameron (1815-1879)

The parting of Sir Lancelot and Queen Guinevere

1874

Canadian artist Jeff Wall is called a leader of ‘tableau photography’. The tableau mode is characterized by a complex game of relay and reference between mediums and historical periods of art, and Wall is regarded as its most eminent practitioner. In interviews and writings, Wall has often referred to specific sources for his work: these include painting, photography and literature. Probably the most important source is the nineteenth-century French painter Édouard Manet and his ‘painting of modern life’. Here are some familiar examples of often cited sources:

The Destroyed Room, Wall’s first transparency-in-lightbox (1978), was inspired by

the painting The Death of Sardanapalus by Eugène Delacroix and is often interpreted in reference to it (formally the connection is obvious, shared themes are

violence, patriarchy).

Picture for Women (1979), has also been linked to the Un bar aux Folies-Bergère (1882) (themes here: urban spectacle, alienation).

A further example: The Storyteller (1986) and Déjeuner sur l’Herbe (1862–1863). Wall replaces the leisurely Parisian bohemians of Manet with homeless people of Vancouver. Like Manet’s Déjeuner sur l’Herbe, The Storyteller marks a key development in art’s philosophical dialogue with nature.

Circular narrative

A story that ends in the same place it began is commonly called a circular or cyclical narrative. Circular narratives can also conclude with the same theme or subject matter that opened the piece. A good example of circular narrative is Pulp Fiction (1994). The film starts out with a diner hold-up staged by "Pumpkin" and "Honey Bunny" and it ends where it began in the diner: Vincent and Jules, who have stopped in for a bite, find themselves embroiled in the hold-up. So it ended at the same place where it started (coffee shop).

Types of narrative structures

Closed structure – this is common film structure where narrative has structured ending. It is when in the end all the questions are answered.

Open structure – it is when the end is not resolved, there is no final conclusion to the story and audience is left to decide upon the ending. A television soap has no final ending; it just has minor endings.

Linear structure – it is a usual form of storytelling. It has a beginning, a middle and an end. For example, Susan Derges ‘Full Circle’ shows tadpoles hatching from frogspawn and developing into frogs. This sequence literally depicts the growth of life in a linear manner.

Non-linear structure – it is when events of the story may be told in non-chronological order. This can be simple as the use of flashbacks or more complex when the narration of events that are widely separated in time may be mixed together, or where events are narrated multiple times from different points of view. A good example of non-linear structure narrative is a film ‘Pulp Fiction’. The narrative is presented out of chronological order, structured around three distinct but interrelated storylines. Although each storyline focuses on a different series of incidents set in different periods of time, they connect and intersect in various ways.

Bibliography:

Bright, S. (2011) Art Photography Now. 2nd edn. United Kingdom: Thames & Hudson.

Short, M. (2011) Basics Creative Photography 02: Context and Narrative. 1st edn. Lausanne, Switzerland: AVA Publishing SA.

Musée d’Orsay (2009) Musée d’Orsay: Julia Margaret Cameron The parting of Sir Lancelot and Queen Guinevere. Available at: http://www.musee-orsay.fr/en/collections/works-in-focus/search/commentaire/commentaire_id/the-parting-of-sir-lancelot-and-queen-guinevere-9756.html?no_cache=1

Oliver, A 2013, 'Illuminating obscurity: An interpretation of the relationship between Jeff Wall and Édouard Manet', Journal Of Visual Art Practice, 12, 1, pp. 109-115, Academic Search Premier, EBSCOhost

Wagstaff, S. and Wall, J. (2005) Jeff Wall: photographs 1978-2004: [publ. on the occasion of the exhibition ‘Jeff Wall. Photographs 1978-2004’, Tate Modern, 21 October 2005-8 January 2006]. 1st edn. New York: distributed by Harry Abrams.