Globalisation

 In terms of the possible subjects within the topical umbrella of Globalisation, Andreas Gursky seems to focus on all of the main factors. His work on primary and secondary industry and construction, effective depict the enormity of the globalised systems of material process and spacial production therein, while the way in which human beings are shown in relation of size to these elements deals with the way people interact with their globalised surroundings, dwarfed and meaningless in comparison.

Topics on this scale require a very specialised set of working practices and equipment. Large format cameras are the only format which has the ability to capture what Gursky sets out to. Increasingly though, his photographs display blatant signs of digital manipulation, suggesting that Gursky's vision and perhaps the scale of his subject's themes, cannot be indexically recorded, needing larger and larger rendering as Globalised structures (both physical and non-physical) grow.

In the image above, Gursky shows a stock exchange, the nerve centre of the capitalist economy. There is no more fitting comment as even those who benefit most from this system are still dwarfed by its scale. In this image, all of the aforementioned elements of his work come together. No one who places humans in such a stark diminutive context next to their greater theme (except a misanthrope), could possibly hold anything but a pejorative view of it. However, Gursky makes his work for galleries and private collectors who pay millions for a piece. Surely there is an evident contradiction in terms of his alleged standpoint and that kind of willful participation in capitalism, the backbone of Globalisation.