Fotograf Magazine

In 1969 Jan Dibbets dug a hole in the shape of an irregular trapezoid into a lawn. He then took a photograph of it from a particular angle, so that in the final picture it appeared as a square (Perspective Correction: Square in Grass, Vancouver 1969). At first sight, the photograph seems to be a montage: a square cut from a photograph of earth and then pasted on an image of a lawn. If we look closer, however, we can see the shadows and pieces of string that mark the edges of the hollowed out shape. This piece is part of a larger series entitled “Perspective Corrections” (late 1960s – early 1970s), which plays upon the transformation of three dimensions into one surface by means of a monocular apparatus. Perspective distortions caused by this transfer can thus be anticipated and exploited.