A landscape in flux

Working in the expanded documentary tradition, Johnny Mccormack (Ngāi Tahu) uses the camera as a tool for recording the movement of our landscapes. His latest body of work, TEMPORAL, takes the viewer on a journey surveying a landscape in flux; climatic and geological time scales that extend across mountains, fault lines and islands throughout Aotearoa. Delicate imprints, imposing landforms and terrestrial silica deposits reveal weather-worn facades, drawing us in to witness tectonic uplift and glacial drift via his lens. Building on his earlier photographic work, in which landscapes — and the buildings and people within them — are woven together with a delicate touch, Johnny’s distinctive photographic voice continues to evolve as he focuses more closely on the elements of Aotearoa that stand out to him: the clay cliffs at Omarama he used to visit with his grandmother; the Southern Alps and their formidable presence. “Ōmakō [pictured] is an iconic and personal landscape from my childhood, as it was on the outskirts of where my grandparents lived and subsequently has been etched into my memory. A theatrical and majestic backdrop that never looks the same through the lens. From glaciers to sulphur, our landscapes are so dynamic. I think for me, it’s important to capture a deeper connection to these places, particularly those that are not touched by human modification, to document and witness what is happening; the weathering of landforms, erosion. I often look for a familiarity in the landscape.” Homecoming, an earlier body of work, represents a longing, the desire to reconnect to certain places, while TEMPORAL is an abstraction of those places. “The pieces in TEMPORAL are devoid of horizon lines. They have an effect on the viewer, whether it is to draw you in or push you out; they can create a sense of claustrophobia because there is no resting place for the eye so you are forced to examine the image in more detail.” johnnymccormack.net