Messing with the Real: Matt Siber

As someone who has always made 'straight' photographs of real things outside the studio, I have been interested for some time in the boundaries we construct around photography of the real, and how they might be pushed in various ways.

Lately I have been looking at the work of artists who use the language of straight photography, yet are somehow intervening in the process of making their images. Here is a particularly contemporary example, of an American artist using a pre-existing visual language in photographing the 'man-altered landscape', yet digitally removing elements to draw our attention to his concerns:

Matt Siber, from Floating Logos

Matt Siber, from Floating Logos

Matt Siber, from Floating Logos

Matt Siber, from Floating Logos

I really enjoy looking at these photographs - it's as if we have seen them before, but have been given new filters through which to view them again. Also, they're funny, which is an underrated quality in photographs.

Matt Siber's work looks at the modes of visual communication in public space. He has a number of interesting projects, which you can have a look at on his website.