Ray-ography

Dadaist artists seemed to always find themselves taking an already developed technique and making it something unconventional.  When it came to photography, which was already prevalent within Paris, Dadaists took the opportunity to play around with the realistic portraits.  Already developed as an artist, Emmanuel Radnitzky, or better known as Man Ray, moved to Paris and became interwoven with the Parisian Dadaists.  Moving in to a different medium, he chose photography as his means of expression, and became most known for the compositions he created at this point.  

Man Ray - Hands

Man Ray created photography that branched out from the basic image printed on to a piece of paper.  He took the images, worked with them, and created different forms through juxtaposing them.  He played with reflections, utilized optical illusions, and expressed a unique beauty of the world around him.  Of course this world was quite limited to the likes of Kiki de Montparnasse, who was his muse and lover.  So when I go about saying the world around him, I simply mean the woman who offered him such great inspiration.  

Photogram by Man Ray 1922

Known as simply a photographer throughout America, he did not limit himself to simply the creation of photos taken by a camera, but rather disheveled the norm when it cam to production of photos.  He re-developed a new style of photography, which are called rayographs.  

Firstly, rayographs, or photograms, was a technique that Man Ray utilized after he moved from America to Paris.  The process involved placing objects on light sensitive paper, creating a negative image formed.  Artists used the photogram as a simple example of negative imagery, mostly putting one or two items on the sheet.  Man Ray created a complexity of juxtaposed images on to the paper, making the negative remnants indistinguishable from each other.  He also began to play with timing, taking some items off before others, or later adding an object to the surface.  This freedom he had created images that were unique and recognizable as his own.  

After reaching a sort of final point in his rayographs, Man Ray turned to creating short films with moving images.  He used the imagery, mostly a mixture of Kiki, other artists, and naturalistic elements, set to expressive music to show underlying interest in the concepts of moving the photo past the snapshot in time.  His dabble in this would eventually lead to the short films he shot. The film below of Kiki de Montparnasse is his evolution from the photography he began to experiment with upon his move to Paris.

  

Photography as a technique is important to the Dada movement, because not only did it lead to the artist  producing short films or founding new techniques, but it was also a platform in which the photomontages were made.  This one faction of art that was first seen by some as the joke of art became the form of expression that expelled from all different styles.