A New "Deep Black" Portrait Style - and Social Difficulties in Shooting Black and White in Thailand

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

Two more photographs in my new, evolving portrait style yesterday, a dark style that seems to create very beautiful, soulful captures of a person.

Arjan Surat, Dejrat Gym (Bangkok)

 

Takrowlek Dejrat Gym (Bangkok)

I invite you to click on each photo above, on a big screen, and really look at these wonderful men

For a while now I've wanted to shoot a different sort of black and white portrait, especially of Muay Thai legends, fighters and krus. It's an extension of my fine art tastes, the way I want to lift the subject to a high (culturally coded) aesthetic, capturing their true dignity as fighters and as men. I purchased some additional equipment, put on a filter I had experimented with in the past, and set to it. It was going to take a while before I zoned in on what I wanted, something rich, soulful, detailed - or so I thought. But practically my first photos taken (of Sylvie, not posted anywhere as yet) were kind of stunning. Among the best portraits I've taken of her. Each frame showed a different quality. Each frame seemed to be pointing to something deep, something that also changed with the edit itself.

In any case these are two photos I took yesterday in Bangkok, both noble men of the Dejrat gym, a Golden Age legendary kru and his fighter. For some time was really hoping to photograph Arjan Surat, as he just has so much natural majesty, and I didn't even know what style of photo I wanted to take with him, other than it being an intimate portrait. In the first one of the frames his strong features resisted this Deep Black edit style, other edits were better and more expressive, so I turned back to Takrowlek, and wow, this one (the 2nd above) just sang. It is really a profound photo, among the best I've been able to reach for, yet it feels like it all comes from him. I went back to my Arjan Surat frames and looked for where I could do something in the same spirit. I wanted to see the differences between the men. There is something to this edit in which the eyes just become incredibly expressive, a true individualism. I found the right frame (almost none of the others would work).

It's enough to say, I've found an aesthetic vein I really want to run down...but, there is just one significant problem: black and white photographs, especially of people, are strongly coded as photos of death in the culture. I suspect as well that with the advent of more widespread color printing (magazines and such) that followed the economic boom (at least in Muay Thai), color indicated all the good things of life. It was rich, dynamic, "modern", not the pale newsprint of the past (more on this in following posts). Missing, perhaps, are our (Western) strong associations with Classic looks, or fine art, which today's Black and White can exude. Westerners and Thais can see these differently.

I wrote a little about this problem as a photographer on Twitter more than a year ago. I want as a photographer, perhaps more than anything, to show a subject themselves in a beautiful way, to lift them up in their eyes...but, my own black and white aesthetics, combined with my American "working man" sensibilities, celebrating the lines of a face, really run hard against widespread Thai aesthetics.

Complicating the matter further is that dark skin is considered less desirable and ugly in Thailand, likely with strong ethnic and racial (even racist) overtones. The darker complexions of Isaan, connected to those of Laos & the Khmer, to which the region is connected and woven from, register as socially low. Many of these in history are perhaps read in the context of conquered people (the burgeoning Siam/Thai Nation indeed raided to the Northeast and would capture and repopulate areas inland, a practice of capture and indentured slave taking that goes back to before the Ayutthaya period). Today whiteness is the mark of beauty. Skin whitening products are everywhere. And this whiteness is not merely the Whiteness of the Westerner, it is prominently the Whiteness of Chinese-like, or K-Pop beauty influence. A sign of affluence. Light skin matters.

above a skin-whitening product, with a masculinity-type that is quite popular in media in Thailand, far from many Isaan-born Nak Muay.

So, when I'm trying to capture the dignity of Thai men, many of them from the lower social classes, my working man aesthetics, and classic fine art sensibilities can run hard against the very cultural picture of beauty, firmly a standard carried by the elite of the country, seen in every television commercial, and every Instagram or phone beautification filter. And, within Thailand as new forms of Muay Thai try to transmute the Muay Thai of the provinces into a Entertainment Bangkok version appealing to hi-so Thais, and to Western fighters and their audiences, these lines of color in photography happen to also reflect class and cultural divisions within the sport and art. There is a sort of whitening of Muay Thai that is happening in Thailand. When photographing and preserving the heritage of Muay Thai I am less interested in the dominant history of the Bangkok Capital, as officially recorded, and more looking to the roots of the sport in its fighters, and the practices that anchored that developed it, much of this of rural, lower-class origin. So in some sense I'm going to be working across the overarching aesthetic of the culture which is shaped by the social realities, really the hegemonies of the Capital and its commerce. But, in tension, as a photographer I am also bringing forth Western appeals to classic aesthetics, elevating working and rural classes in the way that Western aesthetics have evolved to do so. These aesthetics are my way, my hands and fingers, of reaching out and touching the dignity of these men, as I am able to see it...and as I want others to be able see it.

 

I briefly wrote about the difficulty of darker toned, black and white photographs more than a year here:
 

Quote

One of the interesting things in photographing Thailand's Muay Thai is that we (Westerners) come at it from an ideological place of "grit". We want the sweat, hardened lines, the "weather". Thais though see this as "old". Blown out filters are common on social media. Two edits:

I love the edit on the right, but have steered away from it as, as a photographer, I want to photograph within someone something they would like to see in themselves. The tension between West vs Thai is strong in this. Also, the way that even black & white is perceived in Thailand is very different. We can bring in the romanticism of high-art, or classic black and white cinema. A throwback crystallization. But b&w might instead look very old "newspaper" to Thais, or even indicate funeral loss. This is changing as Thais adopt more international high-art aesthetics, but there is also a ballast in the culture. Often I have to think to myself: Should I edit this photo in black and white? even when I prefer to. I do think there is something to be gained to cut across the urge to classic-fy photographs of Muay Thai thru black and white, and explore color treatments that can be read across cultures more. But, my eye is also very black & white driven, and I compare MT to traditional worlds.

It isn't just the tone of skin, as mentioned it is also that black and white photographs can be coded as funerary. So, there are two aspects at play: any darkening of the skin tone (and hard contrasts that bring forward hard lines), and then the absence of color. It's a complex of aspects of black and white imagery.

It just so happens, a few days before taking the two portraits at top I had taken a portrait I really enjoyed of the great coach and former fighter Chatchai Sasakul, a black and white which was best not in the Deep Black style of this post. We sent him the photo privately and he posted it on his Facebook page. It felt good to be embraced. I'm always hesitant to edit and post black and white photographs, even though this aesthetic is properly mine, it's very meaningful to me, and it's central to how I see as a photographer. I do post plenty of black and white photographs, but each and every time I am wary, concerned that the subject just won't like to see themselves that way.

One of the worst things happened. A very powerful promoter saw the photograph Chatchai in a post wherein Chatchai had written about how successful his gym has suddenly become and how thankful he is in celebration of the support everyone is giving. He has several champions in his stable now, and he was smiling...the promoter commented: Please don't post black and white photographs, it scared me, I thought you were dead. Surely, just said off-hand, and maybe even light-heartedly, but it had a big effect. Chatchai took the photo down, replaced it with a color one, and it became something of a point of talk. It is true that black and white photography, especially on social media, can be funerary in Thailand.

So, when I took the camera out to take Takrowlek's portrait a few days later he mentioned the talk. I could feel some nervousness, and after only a few frames he looked away. I stopped photographing. Thais are very socially sensitive, and small group opinions matter. He didn't know, perhaps, what kind of photo I would take. And, I wonder if this look in his eyes where he resolved himself to the photo, in the very first frame, is where his wonderful spirit comes through, a kind of defiant spirit. The interesting thing about Takrowlek is that of all Thai in Thailand he actually has reacted most positively to my black and white photographs in the past. He's shared my previous black and white photographs of himself, enthusiastically. And he repeatedly shares the very gritty, high contrast photo I took of his brother, the fellow fighter and kru Chatchainoi, someone he deeply loves.

above, Chatchainoi

And in the aftermath of my taking those previous photos, Takrowlek started taking dark, high contrast black and white photographs self portraits, and posting them on Facebook. He was exploring black and white photography artistically. In fact, when we entered his gym yesterday to shoot he had a very large, chiaroscuro photo of his daughter on the wall, which he seemed to have taken. He enjoys the black and white aesthetic. He's an original, somewhat iconoclastic thinker, strong in his opinion, and he embraced the black and white aesthetic for himself.

In fact when we sent him my new portraits, I sent two. The beautiful dark one you see at the top of this post, and a much more neutral color photograph, and told him please don't feel like you have to post any of these, they are just for you. He could pick what he liked.

above, the color photo sent along with the Deep Black portrait. Not an edit I would preferably do, but one made to allow more choice. It is a nice photograph, his sweetness comes through, but I would probably push for more out of it.

Takrowlek immediately wrote back that between the two he loved the Deep Black portrait, and even gave a description of what he saw in it, the eyes. I was surprised given his hesitance when shooting, given the social spin put on Chatchai's photograph. I had been quite concerned that it may be hard to even get someone to sit for such a portrait after the bias against black and white portraiture had been given so much wind in those sails. How am I even going to take enough photographs to explore this new portrait style? His response lightened my heart, and gave me some hope. I really want to take these Deep Black portraits, of many Muay Thai fighters and krus, and want to show their eyes, their soul, in a dignified way that maybe the overall culture does not appreciate. I want people to be able to see into them and this mode of photography accomplishes that.

He responded to my share of his Deep Black portrait with these heartening words:

first (machine translate): The picture is ordinary, but what you see, the depth of your eyes, is amazing. Thank you to the photographer. Thank you, thank you.

then: Sincerity is always expressed through the eyes, even without words.

He understands and feels the power of the style, how it draws out the eyes and communicates the heart of the soul. This is so meaningful to me. The portrait landed. This means that the photograph, these photographs, to some degree transcend cultural bounds. The capacity of them to express the eyes means something in both cultural matrices. In that sense they can be unifying.

I'm not sure where this leaves me in my drive to photograph more krus and fighters in my Deep Black portrait style. I'm not sure how readable it is to most of the men I would photograph. I've had very beautiful photographs I took at Rajadamnern in another style, just strong, strong black and whites like no other Muay Thai photographs I've seen, privately be asked to be turned into color by fighters, when I send them to them privately. Their unusual character, something I savor, does not read. And I do not blame them at all, I'm moving against the broad spectrum aesthetic in the culture, and even most sport photography in my own culture. Most Muay Thai photography is hyper colored, very crunchy, almost comic book or digital in style. Very "sweat-spray" and popping. You can see my Rajadamnern photographs here, very moody, sculptural, or psychological, and trending toward fineart (in the West).

Shooting Rajadamnern in Black and White

This was a huge traditional Muay Thai show, everything about it was about color and pop, trying to compete in a high-productive value space with forward-leaning hype of Entertainment Muay Thai which has been beating down the traditional sport. It was the show of the year, proof that the traditional Muay Thai art, which thrived in the old, dingy but profoundly charactered Lumpinee (now gone) could compete in the newly remodeled, updated Rajadamnern Stadium, full of digital screens, light shows. The show actually was not televised, on purpose, nor streamed, because it wanted to call back the great days of in-person gambling and attendance, and featured the biggest fighters in the sport. I experienced the event very differently, because I was not raised in a developing country, peaking now. I am from a country that largely set the tone for commercial development in the 20th century, with American soft power, and in fact suffered from its excesses and loss of meaning it has brought. In Rajadamnern I found a beautiful, old style theater space, a mix of associations, reminiscent of a town's movie theater where everyone went on a Saturday night, or a small, much respected live theater in New York City where great performances were done but only 500 people saw them, in its past. I felt transported to an intimacy, a theatrical intimacy, that was quite special, one any American would want to feel. It felt like a Hollywood premiere, but in a classic age, so for me the classic, missing-from-my-culture, lost-to-my-culture aspects came out as a photographed. (Note, this rare traditional show, with its glorious wall of gamblers, is quite different than many of the shows that now work out of Rajadamnern, which turn their eye to the entertainment Western and Chinese tourist.)

 

above, three screen caps of photos from the big Rajadamnern Stadium show (see the whole album here)

I, with my Westernized aesthetic, see absolute human beauty in those two lower photographs. They feel classic, elevated, but also full of vigor and intensities. The sculptural aspects and the play of light on form (Rajadamnern has spectacular stadium lighting) really come forward for me. This felt like the acme of Muay Thai. The Scorsese film Raging Bull, itself a homage to black and white classics before him, including the boxing film Body and Soul, which in part inspired that film (do see it if you love Boxing and classic film) is evoked, because (unlike much of Thailand) we in American harken back to our own sporting past, much of it from the working class, heroing those great performances with glory. We relate to our past differently.

For this reason the history of 1950s boxing in America, and its capture in media, its representation, I think has powerful visual resonance with Thailand's classic age of Muay Thai, at least for Westerners, because its a lens through which we can understand and celebrate the sport...as classic. No doubt American Boxing itself exerted influence on Thailand and its Muay Thai in the middle of the century, and photographing in this way for me connects up with that historical cross-over, and aligns with America's own glorification of the lower class heroes of generational pugilism. This is an honorific aesthetic, with footing in the sport itself. Arguments can be made that Thailand Muay Thai's Golden Age (1980-1994) homologously mirrors to some degree Boxing's mid-Century era.

above, Jake LaMatta reffing a boxing match at Rajadamnern Stadium in 1969, an appearance which began new emphasis on boxing in the National Stadia which lasted for decades.

This is to say, this kind of Muay Thai photography is readable to the West because of our own retroactive cinematic embrace of American boxing. The aesthetic is readable because it draws on Western conventions and our history. It communicates values that have developed over time, values I champion as an artist. They are not readily readable in Thai culture, even though the culture is internationalizing quickly. (Ironic that I advocate for the non-Internationalization of the traditional sport, as it is fought, bending as it has been to Western fight aesthetics and rules, while as a photographer I bring distinct Western aesthetics, even Americanized aesthetics to the history and preservation of traditional Muay Thai and its men. I realize a tension here.) It's my belief though that there is a the gift that Thailand's traditional Muay Thai has for the West, and to accelerating Globalization. It is the way it embodies many readable classic, lower-class valorizations of ring fighting, yet specifically through its Buddhistic cultural approach to violence itself, in an art that is viewed as quite violent by the West, through aesthetics of calm, control and respect. Thailand, as it is quite busy trying to imitate Western fighting styles, internalizing those aggression-first fighting ethics, trying to draw those dollars and yuan into their economy as an entertainment value, has a much deeper and more profound gift to give to the world...something that is readable in terms of the classic aesthetics of Western fighting traditions. It is the unique way Thais treat the possibles of ring violence, and the notion of dignity within conflict. These irreplaceable values are found in the men who trained and fought, men of color (as it would be qualified in the West), especially in the latter part of the 20th century.

And, any discussion of skin-color and social status (colorism) needs to appreciate that cultures are not a monolith, though its common to treat them that way, and when talking about Western or American culture it too has its colorisms. My aesthetics come out of my class, race and history. Going back to the 2008 Beyonce controversy with L'Oreal and skin tone lightening, up to present day skin-tone accusations in media and presentation, we've learned that lightness or darkness of skin in photography can always be understood as politicized.

And one could imagine that my photographic eye is in some sense exoticizing Thai fighters, perhaps seeing in them working man, fighting man valorization, things that map onto American ideologies of gritty cowboys, people of the Land or urban fighters of the past, cast in this case in the Other. In this I carry something of rugged American individualism, the promise of social mobility of determination & character, quite far from most Thai identities which are more filial and group, almost clan oriented. These are fair slices of judgement to take upon my photographs. We are dealing with idealized forms of masculinity, a hypermasculinity as Peter Vail would say. I though point out that I do photograph my wife, as a fighter, often in the same very dark or gritty motifs (some here), such as the one below from a few years ago, one of my favorite portraits of her (perhaps accidentally invoking masculinity-coded Ripley of Alien). This is just how I see a fighter. And as with Thai fighters sometimes my photos do not correspond to her own preferences of how she'd like to be portrayed, too edged (I am forced to draw back); it is something I have to balance. I've as mentioned I also photographed her in my new Deep Black portrait aesthetic (unposted) and they are just incredibly beautiful photographs, some of the best I've ever taken of her. I've had large prints made. Often though I have to temper how gritty or texturally harsh I might capture her, the woman that I love. I would say though that in some arguable sense photography always exoticizes its subject, cutting them/it out from reality's context, lifting up aspects through light, composition and texture, suppressing others, communicating ideal values, many of them subconscious.

This is to say, when we create art we will always be importing the collectivity of images we have received, and we are all "taught how to read" images as part of our socialization, imparting values to them of the classes we belong to, and aspire to. 

 

My aim as a photographing artist is to raise of the sport and art of Muay Thai to the Western eye, who is primarily my audience, and in many ways it makes sense that as I seek to reveal the value of its men to the West I turn to the most classic versions of image, I move towards fine art, as I find it. I use expensive lenses and appeal to the history of Film Noir, and overall to cinema. And I'll admit that when I started photographing Muay Thai one of my ambitions was to actually change the way Muay Thai was photographed, which I found quite dissatisfying. There was very little Muay Thai black and white photography in the ecosystem (it was actually a great photograph of Sylvie taken by Lord K2 which began my photographic path), and my love of classic film has taken over for me. At the bottom of this post I'll link a thread I started discussing why I want to bring the Film Noir aesthetic to Muay Thai, something which goes beyond just aesthetics. It goes into the very world of Noir, and its treatment of urban, or lower status characters, its framing of masculinity. There is a moral universe it builds which comments complexly on Thailand's Muay Thai, its own status in the hierarchies of culture and its masculinity. It could be imagined that my photos have may influenced other Muay Thai photographers to wade black and white aesthetics, which are more common now, just as I was influenced.

My new experiments with a Deep Black portrait style indeed grew out of my Film Noir, classics aesthetics, but really are also far from them as they are stereotypically conceived, especially in aspects of softness and how it relates to darkness. These photos more seek a way to isolate the seeds of a person in even the finest flickers of light, especially about the eyes, but also in the expressive feature of the face, which you have to strain for a little bit to discover. It's a bit like seeing in the dark, and letting your eyes adjust maybe. (There are examples of this in Film Noir, in the next post). The darkness is there not in tone, but in order to let the light have its own life, its own small power. They participate in the black and white fine art tradition, but for me texturally at another end of the spectrum from much of stylized Film Noir. But, my question, my hurdle is how to negotiate this strong aesthetic urge to photograph these noble men, thus, so nobly, but within a culture where dark is bad or low. I want to show the shining light, which in a sense needs that darkness all around it. It's how these men shine through. And how the sport and art of Muay Thai shines through, from its place in history.

Below, my thread on Film Noir aesthetics and Thailand's Muay Thai:

 

 

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

Eyelight and Aesthetics of Darkness

this frame, above, is just incredible for me. It lasts just a split second

Above are three screen caps from the Gene Tierney Noir China Girl (1942), cinematography by the great Lee Garmes, who likes to shoot very, very dark. He was reportedly booted off Gone With the Wind and replaced for shooting too dark. Lee Garmes was a forerunner of the risky & stylistic dark photography Gordon Willis would achieve in the Godfather (1972), a film of the underworld lower class violence and its masculinity. In the first cap above can see the very extreme eyelight from Gene Tierney which I mentioned here (eyelight). That frame is only there for a second as shadows race over her face in the car, dropping her into almost pure black. You can see the clip linked just above. In the top cap you can also see a more classic Noir eyelight, but Garmes is holding the light back. Her face is softly lit and holds that soft luminosity of twilight, but we are seeing in the dark. And in the 3rd cap you can feel the entire spectrum of dark vs light. In the background you have the hard, classic Noir "blinders" shadows playing in distinct bars where the violence is happening, but in the foreground the shadows are soft against the wall, with something of that day-for-night, moonlight feeling, and the luminous figures really stand forth, without much light. Some of the best Noir aesthetics are not necessarily those of its trademark hard light, but rather its see-in-the-dark moments. Hard light contrasts often set up that experience of trying to look very closely.

Eyelight used to pick up something extraordinary in a figure was taken up by Kubrick in 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), and in Ridely Scott's Blade Runner (1982).

 

the lowest imaged above has fascinated audiences, as faint eyelight it suggests that Dekkerd too was a replicant, matching Rachel.

The use of eyelight in China Girl, as seen in the car at top I think is what finally spurred me to work towards this new vision. I suspect the Deep Black style works through the combination of eyelight, selective focus, and the darkness which pervades in the softer Noir versions of lighting. In this sense its distinctly modern, but also working from classic cinematic emotional styles of lighting, which hold a deeper meaning. I did not set out to create extreme eyelight, and I don't even think I have, but it inspired me to simplify lighting, and to think of composition more throughly through darkness.

Gordon Willis uses hard light to put the eyes in darkness (Godfather, 1972)

The Reading of Eyes in the Dark

The style of reading light through darkness of course goes back to Rembrandt's renown sense of light, and probably much further than that. Rembrandt painted with a darkness he really could push quite far, as can be seen in this self-portrait. The eye-strain to read the eyes amid a soft darknes makes them come alive in a why no directed luminosity could create.

Rembrandt: Self-Portrait

Self-Portrait, oil on panel by Rembrandt, c. 1628

Athena of the Flashing Eyes, Glaukopis (ϒλανκώπις)

The aural luminosity of eyes may go back several thousand years in the Western canon, back to "flash-eyed" Athena, goddess of war. Read this piece on the adventures of translating glaukopis from Homer's Iliad. The owl, a creature of twilight, capable of reflecting light in its eyes, sacredly associated with Athena.

Quote

 

"Glaukos is the most prominent colour term associated with Athena… as well as being one of Athena’s most common epithets, is also one of the most intriguing, open as it is to a variety of interpretations and translations.” (Deacy and Villing. Journal of Hellenic Studies. 129, p.121)

From the above quotation it is clear that Glaukopis (ϒλανκώπις) cannot easily be translated into English. Therefore I am not attempting here to answer conclusively what glaukopis is but the various interpretations given and will attempt to conclude with what may be the most likely.

 Various academics have attempted to translate glaukopis to give a certain colour to Athena’s eyes for example Leaf’s interpretation of “blue-eyed” in 1900. Other colours have also been suggested, light blue, green and even grey. The fact that academics cannot translate Glaukopis to a single colour seems to suggest that Ancient Greek culture did not place as much emphasis on the colour of eyes as descriptions as modern culture do. Many academics now argue that glaukopis refers to the brightness or character of the eyes. Even then there seems to be various translations, “flashing eyes,” “glancing eyes,” “darting eyes” and “bright eyes.” Which one of these characteristics may be considered correct?

One interesting interpretation put across by Day is to connect glaukopis with Athena’s cunning and military prowess.  Day supports this with Hymn 28.2 which reads “bright eyed and inventive.” This can be further supported by the Iliad where she “flashing eyed” led Ares away from battle which resulted in a Trojan defeat. (2010 p.144)  The “flashing-eyed Athene” appears several times in battle or preparation for battle in the Iliad, for example when Agamemnon prepares for battle she appears “in their midst” (Iliad 2.445). Perhaps in the context of battles the translations of “darting-eyes” or “glancing-eyes” may have been better as it could be imagined that constantly observing your surroundings would have been important in battle. Appearing fearsome would have also been important in battle. Iliad again “flashing-eyed” Athene appears next to Odyessus and insures the host keeps quiet while he speaks, in another section she is accompanied by “Terror, and Rout, and Discord” as she urges the Greeks to fight. (Iliad 4.435-450) Athena's connection to the battlefield is further supported by Hesiod's decription of her birth as "bright-eyed Tritogeneia...the queen, who delights in tumults and wars and battles." (Hesiod. Theogony. 920-925)

read more here

 

 

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

The Reading of Color In the History of the Sport

In particular to Muay Thai, these shots of a 1986 Muay Thai magazine help illustrate some of why black and white photographs are not well regarded. 1986 is when the Golden Age really started pumping. The economy was booming and Bangkok full of burgeoning growth. Peoples poured in from the provinces to find work in the surging modernity, and many became gambling fans in the National Stadium, cheering on fighters from their provinces. The provinces were shining on the big national stage, with their fighting heros at Rajadamnern and Lumpinee. This was an extraordinary time in Thailand's history, and the meaningfulness of Muay Thai as a symbol for the nation, but also in terms of regional identities.

These new urban fans bought these magazines, they were the primary mode of following the Capital sport, as National broadcast television did not yet exist. But, you can see the quite stark contrast between the expensively printed cover in color, and the newsprint images inside.

- Sylvie collects and studies old Muay Thai magazines, these are from her collection

1986

In fact you happen to have a picture of Boxing's Marin Hagler and a small piece on him there. Images are blown out and full of contrast, but there just is no comparison to the cover colors.

 

1991

This cover is a little faded, it would have been more brilliant.

In 1991, perhaps the peak of the Golden Age, you have color covers and backs, but the newsprint inside remained as this, many of the images quite dark.

 

1998

by 1998, with the Golden Age principally over for several years, some color pages are in the inside the magazine (above), including a large color centerfold (below), and the black and white pages have improved print. (below) a typical spread:

 

Color as Progress

The story of the sport as it relates to the growth of Thailand as a prosperous Nation, growing in economic power, aesthetically involves climbing out of black and white images towards bright, colorful vibrancy. Black and white in the sport includes the limits of international development, and moving the sport into popping color in many ways signals its arrival on the World standard.

This advertising combined image of Rajadamern as an open-aired stadium, half-full in the 1940s, contrasted with the hyper-saturated (full of tourists) shows that color is coded as.

And black and white newsprint in weekly magazines is contrasted with big pop color fight photos of today, photos that fill social media streams, and are standard-setting of the aesthetic of a sport that has left its black and white days, and joined the World of Color.

above, Rajadamern fight photo

The men I am photographing have lived through this transition. When they were in their fighting days they lived the contrast between newsprint and covers, and watched color and bright clarity slowly grant visible aesthetic (affluence) dignity to the fighters who came after them...until today the Age of endless color and filter on phones.

Layered among the broad-spread aspects of color and skin-tone judgements in the culture, the way in which the Capital sets the political and cultural standard, and communicates itself through media, is also this very particular history of color photography within the sport, as it relates to the Golden Age and the signification of progress...an important value on Thailand.

In some ways American cinema (and its parallel in photography), because of the proliferation of images throughout the 20th century, established a different relationship to color. You have the spectacular Wizard of Oz (1939), and the color Film Noir Leave Her To Heaven (1945) in Technicolor.

but you have truly beautiful, striking boxing black and white photography in the 1950s. As America boomed post World War 2, it wasn't color that became the signature of its prosperity, as least not in such a distinctive, signature way. With that prosperity arose much of Hollywood Golden Age of black and white greatness.

above, a beautiful black and white photograph, in a style and degree of accomplishment which was not unusual for the era. This quality of image is not in the common lore of Thailand's Muay Thai, and so cannot reflect forward on today's black and white. But for Western eyes they can recognize the aesthetic (even more so the case due to Raging Bull).

And as modernity progressed in the late 1950s and 1960s, and color came with it as its signature, it appears that black and white imagery retained its own dignity and aesthetic legacy in the West, something that in future decades would anchor itself in nostalgia for the values of the past. There is in the American psyche a kind of dual, schizophrenic aesthetic, one which maintains black and white legacy as a distinct signal of values one wishes to retain or refind, ways of relating to each other that have been washed away thinned by Capitalism's and Commercialism's march.

 

Because Thailand as a developing country did not live through this same history in terms of color representation and its depiction of meaningful values aligned with its own economic growth, especially in the provinces, necessarily color will be coded differently in photography, and represent different things. In the West we can feel that we have lost important values as we have flown headlong into a futurism, promising infinite growth and liberty.

There is ever an appeal to what is vintage, as possibly lost, and this plays out not only in terms of color, but sometimes in terms of focus as well, as can been seen in Roger Deakins' innovative use of lenses in The Assassination of Jessie James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007, below), to approximate the fading images of antique photography, making us feel like we are looking through an eye of the past.

There seems to be something of this at play in my use of focus in Deep Black portraits as well, not only working in the register of black and white, light and darkness, but also along an index of focus and clarity, itself historically coded.

 

 

 

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

This thread was inspired by the opportunity think about my new experiment with Deep Black stylistics in Muay Thai portraiture, and much of what followed was my reflection on likely influences, things at play in own own aesthetic choices and the basic techniques I'm using in capture. I want to understand more richly what I'm doing, but also to see why it works, because the images are somewhat startling to me, more than a sum of their parts. Something is happening within them that I can only describe as my sensation that "the camera sees". It sees things that are there, but are often just flitting, as dim reflections of powerful truths. As I edit portraits dimension of personality and character constantly are morphing in varying signatures. In this case, I'm just very, very surprised, recognizing on the faces something I feel in them when in their presence, but something impossible to put words to...but the thread is also about my struggle with black and white photography in Thailand, and feeling my way through mixed ambitions in representing the art. And, these particularly styled photographs, due to being so very dark, and the possible difficulties in their reception, make those long waiting concerns come to the surface even more. They are part of this photographic style. They cannot be separated from them, and in this way address the ways in which I believe that black and white photography (at least to the West) opens doors of rich value, an honoring of a sport and art that is not their own, which points us back into our own history, our own traditions, our own past...but also, Thailand's Muay Thai, because of its Buddhism, cuts through several Western problematics, especially those concerning our relationship to violence, the more reckless affects involving loss of control, and how that relates to entertainment values, and social values, and masculinity itself. And for me, some of this truth is found in the eyes.

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

Parallel Aesthetics

In showing the way in which dynamic color photography in magazines in boxing can co-exist in American representations, along with fine art black and white photography, here are photographs of Mike Tyson in 1986 (Sports Illustrated, inside pages) and in 1988 by the fine art photographer Albert Watson.

 

 

These are in the same years as the early Muay Thai magazines filled with newsprint black and whites, behind color covers at the top of this post. The image styles, depicting the exploits of an urban kid (above training in the Catskills), Mike becoming the youngest Heavyweight world champion in history do not conflict. He is simultaneously embraced by a big, glossing color National Magazine, and also raised up as a subject of fine art black and white, expressing a classical beauty.

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

Very Dark Muay Thai Photography By Thais

I'm also not purely directly influenced by Western aesthetics in my quest to capture Muay Thai. More than 10 years ago a Thai Chiangmai University student photographed Sylvie and her fight in an extremely dark, beautiful fine art way. We went to his gallery opening for the photos, and among them is as beautiful a fight photograph I've ever seen, and probably my favorite fight photo - which we titled Resurrection, of Sylvie regardless of photographer.

this is just one of the great Muay Thai photos, as far as I'm concerned.

This last shot is a portrait of the fighter Neung, all of the photos within that Film Noir style. This Thai photography student, Maestoso Top, no doubt unconsciously influenced my own possibilities of seeing Muay Thai in black and white, as this was before I had begun shooting, and well before I even realized how negatively coded black and white photographs could be. Chiang Mai University students tend to be affluent, and he's clearly working from a fine art sensibility which draws on classic cinema, but this is the artistic expression of a young Thai photographer, how they saw local Muay Thai fighting and the sport itself in 2013. We posted about the opening here.

[Kevin von Duuglas-Ittu]

Thailand's Photography and King Bhumibol Adulyadej Rama IX

The story of photography in Thailand, and its meaning, can probably not be told without the absolute figure of King Bhumibol who presented ideal masculinity to the nation for 7 decades. Iconic to him was his embrace of the camera and photography, in part a symbol of his modernity and internationalism, as he helped usher in the development of Thailand into a modern Nation starting in 1946 just as Rajadamnern Stadium had been completed.

I don't know enough about the aesthetics of the culture, and photography's place within it to follow the impact he had on photographic styles, but many, many Thai men picked up the camera and became at least amateur photographers following his example. (Master K, Sylvie's first Thai kru in his 70s, an ex-pat in America then, was a photographer in the mode of the King's image.) I'm not even sure if or how his own photographs were received (if they became public, if they influenced Thai styles). But, the mostly black and white photographs of him with his camera is surely powerful anchors in the aesthetics of past masculinity, and may play into some capacity to see black and white photography as meaningful and beautifying.

edit in: here is an exhibition of HM King Bhumibol's photographs put on 6 years ago.

 

 

 

The modernizing King HM Mongkut Rama IV (reign 1851-1868) was apparently the first Thai/Siamese monarch to read photography favorably.

"Photography came to Thailand during the reign of King Rama 3 but, in that time people still believed that to mold the figure or take a picture of oneself will shorten his or her life. No one interested in this thing until the reign of King Rama 4..."

H.S.H Princess Poonpismai Diskul

 

Then HM King Chulalongkorn Rama V

“...I had sent you six cameras, one for you, One for Ying Klang, one for Ying Noi, one for Erb, one for Earn and one for Sadab...”

A letter of King Rama 5 to H.R.H. Krom Praya Dumrongrajanuphab

          Photography was very popular among female royal members in the inner court. Many royalties could take photograph skillfully such as HRH Princess OraprabandhRambai and H.R.H. Princess Adisaya Suriyabha. Chao Chom Erb and Chao Chom Earn were praised for their photography technique. They also could develop the pictures by themselves.

more on the history of photography and Thai royalty