Tamara Dean

• Name one thing you like about being outside with nature. Share these responses with your class.
• Dean’s work explores rituals in nature. A ritual is a set of actions repeated over and over again in the same way. As a class discuss the rituals, ceremonies or traditions you practice either at home or at school.
• Share a special place outside that you visit. What makes this place special? Do you collect fallen leaves or look for wildlife?
• Other than change in temperature, what other signs suggest the seasons are changing?
• Tamara Dean was a photojournalist before becoming a fine art photographer. What is the difference between a fine art image and one that appears in a newspaper?
• Imagine removing your shoes and stepping inside one of Dean’s photographs. What would this environment feel like underfoot? What might this place smell like? What sounds would you hear?

• Investigate the pre-Raphaelites. Compare Dean’s work to these artists both in terms of their technique and conceptual approach to composing an image. Research some other contemporary photographers who play with intense contrast between light and dark.
• Research the locations where Dean has staged her photographs throughout Australia. Other than being in a natural environment, what qualities do these sites have in common? Suggest a place where Dean might consider for the location of her next photographic series.
• Dean has been inspired by female photographers Sally Mann, Mary Ellen Mark and Carol Jerrems. Investigate these artists and compare their photographic works. What do you think appeals most to Dean about these artists’ images?
• Light is the most important element for a photographer. Compare Dean’s work with that of Bill Henson, Anne Ferran or Justine Varga – all in the Gallery’s collection. Compare the artists’ use or manipulation of light in their practice.

• Using natural materials, create a work of art that responds to your favourite season.
• Write a Haiku poem or creative prose writing piece about your favourite time spent outside with nature.
• In Our Nature follows the seasons of spring, summer, autumn and winter to respond to ageing and the cycles of life. Create a series of photographs, animation or video work that celebrates the lifecycle of an insect or plant.
• Think about your favourite place in nature. Create a sensory experience of this space by collating textures, sounds and aromas.
• Dean spends months planning a photograph which includes concepts, props, models, location and of course light. Create a series of photographic works captured at dusk (golden hour).
• Today we live in an era where nearly everyone has a camera with them 24hours a day. This allows us to capture thousands of candid or spontaneous images, sometimes with little consideration of composition and light. Create a photograph that requires you to use models and natural light. Plan your image thoroughly including concept and composition. Dean finds the directing of her subjects to be the most challenging skill. Explain why you think Dean finds this challenging. What new skills did you develop when planning and shooting your image?

In Our Nature provides a platform to learn more about biological sciences including the growth, survival and classification of living things. Pretend you are a scientist and Dean’s photographs contain specimens that require analysis.

• Identify and classify the organisms that you can see in this environment.
• Compare Shoaling to one of the images in the later series In Our Nature. List as many different living organisms that may live in these environments.
• What differences do you notice between the natural environments in each photograph? Identify which images represent the different seasons. What evidence can you see to support your observations?
• All living things depend on each other and the environment to survive. Name a living organism that lives in one of the environments in Dean’s photographs. What features and adaptions help them to survive here?

Working with Tamara Dean by Joanna Kitto

In my curatorial role at the Samstag Museum of Art, I was Tamara’s assistant, helping prepare the models and set up the shoots: then, during a moment of inspiration by the artist, I became a subject in Elephant ear (Alocasiaodora) in Autumn.

Tamara has a keen interest in the natural cycles of life, death and the seasons. For her series In Our Nature, she gathered individuals across a wide range of ages and backgrounds. Most of us had never modelled before. Tamara placed us in the natural world – in the water and among the trees and shrubberies of Adelaide’s botanic gardens and parks. We were encouraged to step off the walking paths and beyond the barriers in the botanic gardens, into the lotus pond and across the soft ground of the Conservatory’s ‘forest’ floor. We inhabited nature and became tangled in the foliage, invited by the artist to move through it and then sit still among it.

The seasons were Tamara’s real muses. She chose our locations by exploring the gardens making links between the plants and the body. Tamara finds the places she wants to shoot in, brings in her models and directs us through something that she is determining herself, shifting direction suddenly if the light changes. The shoots took place at dusk. We would wait quietly until the ‘golden hour’ when the sun begins to set and everything is bathed in an amber glow. Then we would step in. Tamara has a disarming quality that made us trust her and her vision entirely despite our inexperience as photographic subjects. We would often forget the taboo of nakedness as the experience reminded us of our connection to the environment around us.