James Hugunin


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"Famous Photographs, Verbal Translations of" (1975) consists of four book illustrations of famous photographs accompanied by my "verbal translations" of each of these images made in the exact proportion as the original four photographs. The each text includes comments by the photographer, by critics, historians, and by myself, creating a complex intertextuality interpretive responses vis-a-vis the photograph so translated. In gallery presentation format, the books are placed on pedestals with the books open to the images so translated, while the verbal translations are matted, framed, and hung on the wall opposite the pedestals' placment in the gallery so one cannot see both the translation and the image at the same time. 

 

 
The images that were translated (Garapata Beach by Brett Weston
in the foreground); verbal translation by James Hugunin below

 

 



James Hugunin teaches Photo History and Critical Theory at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago.