Susan Derges

{{Short description|British photographer}} {{Infobox artist | honorific_prefix = | name = Susan Derges | honorific_suffix = | image =  | image_size = | alt = | caption = | native_name = | native_name_lang = | birth_name =  | birth_date = {{birth year and age|1955}} | birth_place = [[London]] | baptised =  | death_date =  | death_place = | resting_place = | resting_place_coordinates =  | nationality = | education = | alma_mater = | known_for = Camera-less photographic processes | notable_works = | style = | movement = | spouse = | partner = | children = | parents = | father = | mother = | relatives = | family = | awards =  | elected = | patrons = | memorials = | website =  | module = }}  [[Image:Rivertaw.jpg|thumb|300px|''River Taw, 19 January 1999'', photograph, 76.2 cm x 30.5 cm by Derges]] '''Susan Derges''' (born 1955) is a British photographic artist living and working in Devon. She specialises in [[Photogram|camera-less photographic processes]], most often working with natural landscapes.<ref name="va">{{cite web |publisher= [[Victoria and Albert Museum]] |url= http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/c/camera-less-photography-artists/ |title= Susan Derges |work=Photography |accessdate= 15 February 2011}}</ref> She has exhibited extensively in Europe, America and Japan and her works are in several important museum collections.

Derges' work is held in the collections of the [[Art Institute of Chicago]], the [[Metropolitan Museum]] in New York, and the [[Victoria and Albert Museum]] in London. She has received an Honorary Fellowship of [[The Royal Photographic Society]].

==Biography== Derges was born in London in 1955. Having studied basic theoretical physics, she draws playfully on certain scientific theories in her artworks, such as the notion that in physics the observer's decision affects what is observed.<ref name=":1">{{Cite journal|last=Ede|first=Siân|date=2016-12-21|title=Science and the contemporary visual arts|journal=Public Understanding of Science|volume=11|pages=65–78|language=en|doi=10.1088/0963-6625/11/1/304|s2cid=146971107 |issn=0963-6625}}</ref> She began her artistic career as a painter working in London and Berlin in the 1970s,<ref name=":0">{{Cite book|title=Photographers and research : the role of research in contemporary photographic practice|last=Shirley|first=Read|others=Simmons, Mike|date=5 August 2023 |isbn=9781138844322|location=New York, NY|oclc=972503167}}</ref> studying painting at the [[Chelsea College of Art and Design]] from 1973 to 1976 and at the [[Slade School of Art]] from 1977 to 1979. She moved to Japan in 1980, where she turned to certain early photographic processes, [[Photogram|camera-less photography]]—exposing images directly onto photographic paper.<ref name=":0" /> These techniques she has continued to refine and develop to this day.

From 1981 to 1985 she lived and worked in Tokyo, Japan, receiving a Rotary Foundation Award (1981),<ref name=":2">{{Cite web|url=http://www.artnet.com/artists/susan-derges/biography|title=Susan Derges Biography – Susan Derges on artnet|website=www.artnet.com|access-date=2019-03-23}}</ref><ref name=":3">{{Cite web|url=https://www.widewalls.ch/artist/susan-derges|title=Susan Derges|website=Widewalls|access-date=2019-03-23}}</ref> JVC Award (1984){{Citation needed|date=March 2013}} and carrying out postgraduate research at [[Tsukuba University]]. From 1986 to 1991 Derges lived in London, moving to [[Dartmoor]], Devon in 1992. In 1993 she received a South West Arts Award{{Citation needed|date=March 2013}} and was appointed Lecturer in Media Arts at the [[University of Plymouth]], Plymouth. From 1997 to 1999 she was an external examiner for the BA in Fine Art: Photography at [[Middlesex University]].

==Work== Derges's 1991 series ''The Observer and the Observed'' explored the relationship between object and viewer, and art and science.<ref name=":2" /> Propelling a jet of water through the air, Derges used a strobe light to capture the suspended lens-like droplets set against a blurred image of her own face.<ref name=":1" /> During the 1990s, Derges became well known for her camera-less photographs—or photograms—of water.<ref name=":0" /><ref name=":2" /><ref name=":3" /> Using the landscape at night as her makeshift darkroom, Derges submerged large sheets of photographic paper in rivers, using a flashlight and the moon to create exposure.<ref name=":2" /><ref name=":3" />

Having trained in painting, Derges expressed an early interest in [[Abstract art|abstraction]] because "it offered the promise of being able to speak of the invisible rather than to record the visible".<ref>Kumar, Satish. "Rivers & Stars." ''Resurgence & Ecology''. No. 223 March/April 2004. p. 20- https://reader.exacteditions.com/issues/45422/page/20</ref> She turned to camera-less photography after experiencing frustration at the way "the camera always separates the subject from the viewer".{{Citation needed|date=March 2013}} Much of her subsequent work has dealt with this relationship – of separation and connectedness with the natural world. In Derges' photography, nature imprints patterns and rhythms of motion, growth and form directly on the light-sensitive surface of the photographic emulsion, such as falling water drops, busy honeycombs, and vessels of germinating toad's eggs.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Kemp|first=Martin|date=1997-11-06|title=Derges's designs|journal=Nature|language=en|volume=390|issue=6655|pages=27|doi=10.1038/36231|issn=1476-4687|doi-access=free|bibcode=1997Natur.390...27K }}</ref>

Her images are often beautiful, conjuring [[Metaphysics|metaphysical]] and [[metaphor]]ical layers of meaning. Derges has said that ideas propelling her projects were "about becoming close to the element of the river, as a metaphor of immersion and participation."<ref name=":0" /> Her methods have been consistently experimental, a constant search for new camera-less methods of recording imagery, including the photogram, while directly connecting with the world she observes. Exploring the intuitive, she says, "I often have begin with something that is unknown to me that I have a sense I need to know about. I'm trying to dig into the unconscious and into the unknown... I begin with an intuition or a sense of an area that I want to explore but it is not fully conscious."<ref name=":0" /> Cycles of life, death and change, and their relationship to physical experience are explored through visual metaphors that borrow from science, nature, psychology, and art.<ref name=":0" />

Derges first experimented with camera-less photography while living in Japan. Her 1985 work ''Chladni Figures'' was produced by sprinkling carborundum powder directly onto photographic emulsion where it was exposed to [[Sound|sound waves]] at different frequencies (see [[Ernst Chladni]]), creating ghostly black and white images of natural order and chaos.

For her 1991 series ''The Observer and the Observed'' Derges explored the interdependence of [[observation|viewer]] and [[Objectivity (philosophy)|object]] – creating images appearing as droplets of water containing faces, while simultaneously showing her own face with small droplets suspended in her view.

For the 1997 ''River Taw'' series she worked at night, placing [[photographic paper]] on the river bed and allowing the images to be exposed through ambient light, aided by the use of a flash gun.<ref name="va" /> Using the river near her Devon home as a lens, Derges captured fragments of ivy, ice, and debris reflected in or passing through the water.<ref name=":2" /> Her technique involved a very direct and unmediated physical relationship with the landscape, while her ''Under The Moon'' series involved working with photographs of the moon and combining these with water and branch patterns exposed to sound vibrations in the darkroom.{{Citation needed|date=March 2019}}

Her 2017 series ''Tide Pools'' was developed with the assistance from the department of Marine Biology at the University of Plymouth, where she served as Visiting Professor of Photography.<ref name=":0" />

Her images, though based upon the capturing of external natural realities, take on a metaphorical dimension that echo the inner life of the [[Unconscious mind|unconscious]] and [[Imagination|imaginative]].{{Citation needed|date=March 2013}}

==Collections== Derges' work is held in the following permanent collections: * [[The Gallery Of Sean Roche]], Billingshurst, IL<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.youtube.com/menkissing|title=Roche, Sean|website=[[YouTube]] }}</ref> * [[Art Institute of Chicago]], Chicago, IL<ref>{{cite news|title= derges, Susan|url=http://www.artic.edu/aic/collections/artwork/artist/Derges%2C+Susan|newspaper=Art Institute of Chicago|accessdate=21 January 2014}}</ref> * [[Metropolitan Museum]], New York<ref>{{cite web|title=Susan Derges|url=http://metmuseum.org/collections/search-the-collections?&ft=*&who=Susan+Derges&pg=1|publisher=*[[Metropolitan Museum of Art]]|accessdate=21 January 2014}}</ref> * [[Victoria and Albert Museum]], London<ref>{{cite web|title=Derges, Susan|url=https://collections.vam.ac.uk/name/derges-susan/2867/|publisher=Victoria and Albert Museum|accessdate=21 January 2014}}</ref>

==Awards== * 2014: Honorary Fellowship of [[The Royal Photographic Society]]<ref>{{Cite news|url=http://www.rps.org/news/2014/september/rps-awards-2014|title=RPS Awards 2014|access-date=2017-01-17}}</ref>

* 2015 Centenary Medal of [[The Royal Photographic Society]] in recognition of outstanding contribution to the art of photography. <ref>{{Cite web |title=Susan Derges HonFRPS |url=https://rps.org/about/awards/the-rps-awards-2025/rps-awards-2025-recipients/susan-derges-honfrps/ |access-date=2025-11-20 |website=rps.org |language=en-GB}}</ref>

==Publications== * ''River Taw.'' London: Michael Hue-Williams Fine Art, 1997. {{ISBN|1900829045}}. * ''Woman Thinking River.'' San Francisco: [[Fraenkel Gallery]]; New York: Danziger Gallery, 1999. {{ISBN|1881337065}}. * ''Liquid Form, 1985–99.'' London: Michael Hue-Williams Fine Art, 1999. {{ISBN|190082907X}}. With an essay by Martin Kemp. * ''Kingswood.'' Maidstone, Kent: [[Photoworks]], 2000. {{ISBN|0953534049}}. * ''Elemental.'' Göttingen: [[Steidl]], 2010. {{ISBN|3869301503}}. * ''Shadow Catchers: Camera-less Photography'', Victoria & Albert Museum/Merrell, London, 2012. {{ISBN|978-1858945927}}

==References== {{Reflist}}

==General references== * [https://web.archive.org/web/20081013111610/http://www.resurgence.org/gallery/susan-derges/susan-derges.html Resurgence gallery with Susan Derges.]

==External links== * {{Official website|www.susanderges.com}} (requires Flash Player) * [http://www.artnet.com/artist/5128/susan-derges.html Susan Derges on Artnet] * [http://www.mhs.ox.ac.uk/derges/ Susan Derges, 'Natural Magic' exhibition, Museum of the History of Science, Oxford]

{{DEFAULTSORT:Derges, Susan}} [[Category:1955 births]] [[Category:Living people]] [[Category:20th-century British photographers]] [[Category:21st-century British photographers]] [[Category:20th-century English women artists]] [[Category:21st-century English women artists]] [[Category:20th-century British women photographers]] [[Category:21st-century British women photographers]] [[Category:Academics of the University of Plymouth]] [[Category:Alumni of Chelsea College of Arts]] [[Category:Alumni of the Slade School of Fine Art]] [[Category:English women photographers]] [[Category:Photographers from Devon]] [[Category:Photographers from London]]