CANARY WHARF, E14
London Archive Chronicles
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Going through the Canary Wharf on the DLR, especially in the haze of the morning hours, is an experience. The sun rising from somewhere beyond the Isle of Dogs, the colours of the dawn’s reflection on the walls of glass, ruled, like a notebook page; then going over the bridges and seeing everything reflected from the water, as if there being another dimension in there somewhere, thinking how bizarre it is that these structures are built as if on water, with new ones under construction and being completed, and the building that has been a skeleton for 12 years already. There are old ships and luxury apartments, looking so impersonal to live in but providing such a futuristic backdrop for my commute.
It was foggy that morning, and I knew what I wanted to photograph. I got off the train at West India Quay station, walked at the south end of the platforms, and found a spot with the least restricted view towards Canary Wharf station. I took a few light meter readings and composed the image. Looking through the viewfinder, however, I decided to change the shutter speed from 1/25 to 1/50 (my Rolleiflex dates before the time shutter speeds were fixed to the ones in use today) because so much of the area inside the frame was permeated with almost translucent mist. The fog of the early morning was already beginning to disperse. I waited for a few trains to go past and one to leave the platform towards Lewisham. Just before the next train to Bank came in full view, I pressed the shutter. I had seen this view when, trying to hide my excitement, I had one time gotten a front seat and at another time the very last seat on the DLR. This sight of the Canary Wharf DLR station has since been on the back of my mind. The decisive moment to take the photograph came when a day off and thick fog over London coincided. I wonder though if it is misleading to say that I as the photographer was the creator of this image, in the sense that I would have had an original idea and would have made this photograph as an object. I took this image; I saw it; and I copied it with a camera apparatus. And yes, I could have produced a printed image, therefore an object, out of the 6x6cm- sized frame on a reversal film. Nevertheless, the sight is still out there for anyone else to photograph when the weather so permits. When I have mentioned this before, some very kind people have come to my rescue and defended my artistry by saying, for example, that I nevertheless have gone and wandered looking for photographs and brought an image to the public to look at. I agree with this, and it is indeed what every photographer holds onto. I don’t think I am belittling photography or what I do in general when I question the premise of the Artist Photographer. I am merely pointing out that the role of an artist photographer is challenging because anything can be framed and made into an image. The real, if I may insist on its existence, must precede its representation. I know, I know. The post-structuralist theory and the merry-go-around of the real and the representation. But my point is pragmatic. There is, however, something (else) that can’t be replicated or represented by creating an art object: being present, even for a short while, and seeing. Looking, breathing, being quiet. In that moment, there is also painful restlessness, a piercing realisation of being next to something beautiful and harmonious but being only next to it, not part of it. I feel that pain often but haven’t, until now, wanted to put it into words and look at it. Why? Have I thought it pointless? Why am I now willing to do this, hold that pain, like one does to a stone against the light, in order to see its contours better? Or am I? What can be said about this image, about it specifically as a photograph? Photographs are loaded with the capacity of meaning, but those interpretations have to be communicated, said, written; there have to be words. Art criticism or a critical reception of art works is a kind of interrogation of biases, meanings and readings, an arena where philosophical undercurrents are debated. To some, it is a conversation between the viewer and the image. There is an expectation that I, as the photographer, should contribute to this discussion, but I have always found this dual role stifling. I feel that I can’t occupy both of those positions simultaneously without making work that is self-conscious, literal, or only in dialogue with the art world. As the photographer, as the operator of the camera apparatus — the magical black box with a mechanical eye and an ability record what it sees — I am by no means innocent or neutral. Is it obvious, for example, that I am a white European and a female by looking at this image? And if so, is it damning? I keep going off a tangent in trying to read this photograph. Perhaps, having taken the image, I am too close to it to do so. Canary Wharf DLR station was opened in 1991 when the Isle of Dogs was regenerated after the closure of the London Docks. The station is built into the base of one of the first skyscrapers on the site what used to belong to the West India Docks. The photographs below depict this site before the docks were demolished. (originally published 26.03.2021) |
© Carita Silander
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SOURCES AND FURTHER READING
https://www.thetrams.co.uk/dlr/stations/Canary_Wharf https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canary_Wharf_DLR_station Pictures of the Docks http://www.urban75.org/london/docks.html https://londonist.com/2016/06/dazzling-then-and-now-photos-show-london-s-changing-face |
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Entrance gates to West India Docks, photograph, date unknown
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General view of West India Docks, photograph, 1977
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The Endurance, in the south West India Dock, before sailing for the Antarctic on the 1914 Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition. Photograph, 1914.
Images, except author's own, reproduced with the kind permission of London Picture Archive www.londonpicturearchive.org.uk
Images, except author's own, reproduced with the kind permission of London Picture Archive www.londonpicturearchive.org.uk