Naima Khan wanders around an ambitious but all too brief exhibition at Tate Modern.
Out of the five displays at New Documentary Forms photography exhibition, at least two of them should be spilling out of albums, or piled up in mislabelled boxes in attics and sheds. Part of the experience of looking at photos, particularly those documenting real life as it unfolds, is the sense of discovery that comes with it. This sense of revelation and wonder is rather lost inside the pristine white walls at Tate Modern.
Fittingly the exhibition claims to explore this very question – looking at how appropriate museums are for the this kind of art. But there's an important difference between a museum exhibiting photojournalism as historical artefact and a clean-cut gallery – as Tate Modern is – holding up an image for aesthetic examination.
The series looks at five photographers each exploring completely different themes, subjects and tones. In this sense there's great variety, but a lack of cohesion and depth. The clearest examples of a 'new' documentary form are found in Akram Zaatari's display, which showcases the work of Lebanese studio photographer Hashem el-Madani, who worked predominately in the '40s and '50s. Black and white images of school children with blank expressions and awkward couples in wedding garb make me jealous of Zaatari. He got to discover the images and ask questions about who these people are and what they're doing
But frustratingly, for visitors to the Tate, the text that accompanies these works is irritatingly brief. El-Madani's pictures of emphatic kissing and celebration of a new radio are incredibly interesting, but only for the story behind them. In order to make sense properly, these images require the kind of full exposition (and accompanying documentation of the period) that would be provided in a museum. Such works just don't belong here.
In the next room Mitch Epstein's display, American Power, takes a magnifying glass to the world's biggest concrete jungle and looks at our relationship with our landscape. It's typical of most of the other sections in that a few images are unforgettable but most of it we're already overly acquainted with via magazines and newspapers. But one image in particular stands out as something new. A bright, colourful caravan park at the foot of a gargantuan power station. Yes, it's an obvious contrast, but striking nonetheless and by zoning in on something relatively small to draw attention to something larger Epstein creates a feeling of something unfamiliar.
By contrast, the work of Guy Tillim and Luc Delahaye are the most recognisable as the work of photojournalists but, brought together in this exhibition, we have an opportunity to appreciate their differences. Tillim's images provoke thoughts on the consequences and responsibility of photographers by putting people and their emotions at the centre. He photographs revolution, violence and hope all at once, but makes us question whether our consumption of such images is based on something sensationalist. Favouring a stationary camera to something more portable, Delahaye chooses his stage and brings us huge, detailed pictures but more like a statement.
The works on show hint at a range of fascinating themes and ask some important questions – particularly about where new documentary forms ought to be exhibited – but it all feels too brief and straightforward, with no sense of discovery. Images that chart the development and collapse of nations and the individuals involved surely deserve more.
New Documentary Forms is at Tate Modern until 31st March 2012
Image: Mitch Epstein, Biloxi, Mississippi 2005, © Mitch Epstein. Courtesy of Sikkema Jenkins & Co., New York
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