Scenes from the ImageObject symposium. The day got off to a great start with a wider perspective given on contemporary photographic art practice by Lyle Rexer. It generated some lively discussion in the Q&A session afterwards, making it a perfect way to start the symposium. Jillian Offenbeck from the Archive of Modern Conflict (one of the event’s sponsors) gave us an interesting insight into the collecting of contemporary daguerreotypes by Amc, something close to the heart of the event. Takashi Arai gave us a fascinating and personal insight into his daily daguerreotype project and how it was influenced by the tsunami and the following reactor meltdown in Japan. I gave an account of my daguerreotypy of Maori culture in New Zealand, and spoke about my mobile darkroom facility. Breaking new ground for the ears of contemporary daguerreotypists in the room was Mike Robinson with his revelatory talk on the “Colours of the Daguerreotype”. The content of the talk is part of Mike’s ongoing research for his PhD dissertation entitled “The Techniques and Material Aesthetics of the Daguerreotype”. Once published it will be of great assistance to all those making daguerreotypes and we look very much forward to it.
Our aim with the IO event is to help expand the genre – to have more people making more daguerreotypes. We hope by holding this annual event we can further what cdags does online, and we are already looking forward to next year: IO-2.