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Category: Final Major Project (page 1 of 8)

THANKYOU

Since the beginning of this project, and writing my statement of intent, I wanted to focus more on the elements such as wind, fire, earth and water. Including the pull on the earth and the effect this had on our bodies from the moons gravitational pull. While I knew I wanted to focus on women and hyper femininity my ideas of what this should be have changed so much since I began. I have now realised the difference between feminism and femininity. My project has evolved so much since the research I conducted in the beginnings. While I still stuck to the mother nature idea, following my final book titled ‘Mother’ the concepts and ideas have transformed themselves into different ideas of what the ‘Earth Mother’ is or behaves like. I took the ideas of ‘Mothers’ a protector which went into be looking at ‘Skin’ ‘Sister Relationships’ ‘MeToo Stories’ and ‘Beauty’ I have linked all of these shoots back to ‘Mother’ in a very conceptual way while still allowing myself to link back to the first initial ideas. Skin was about the protector in all our lives while being photographed in a very delicate and feminine way with nudity and soft fabrics caressing the skin. It also  features raw meats to juxtapose the ideas of soft tissue. The sister relationships is something I have never experienced myself being an only child, I went all the way to Switzerland to photograph two sisters who have always been a part of my life, this shoot was where I really involved the different elements of the sun kissing the skin and cold water refreshing the mind and body. My portrait series really hit home for me I wanted to understand peoples relationships with one another and seeing how open people would be with a stranger allowing me into their worlds just for a second and documenting this on a film camera once again allowed me to use a different medium rather than just digital, this part of my project made me reflect on my past and how I have dealt with my own MeToo story Finally beauty, as any other 22 year old I am obsessed with makeup but changing the way we look for all the many different reasons we do, this project allowed me to look into how others define beauty I focused on ‘Beauty Papers’ and others who are trying to redefine beauty and a natural beauty. I did not see my project taking shape this way at all. I am so overjoyed with my final outcomes because a couple weeks ago I could not see how this was ever going to happen! My final outcome was comprised of four different photoshoots where I went into much more research than I have ever done before furthering my reading which I really enjoyed. I wanted to do less shoots and much more in-depth research and analysis while still allowing myself to do the best I could in the shoots. I also did six personal shoots along side this project for the New Designers and just personal work. My final outcome was a hard back book comprised within a magazine phonebook layout pushing myself with different layouts that I have never tried before.  My favourite part of this project was the freedom of allowing myself to further understand who I want to be in the future and what kind of artist I would like and aspire to become. Without this university and final major I would be a very different personal I personally feel like I have grown so much since we began. I would like to take the time to say thank you to everyone who has helped me get to this point in my career. Jules and Mark have put up with me for far too long. So this thank you goes out especially to you both, I could not have done it without you.

Susanne

“I worked at the BBC in the early 80s when all the women were warned of certain men and to avoid them in lifts. It wasn’t unusual for bosses not specifically just at the BBC, to grope women in the lifts and we put often just up with it.  I also worked in a pub and a golf club from the age of 16-21 and got plenty of ‘abuse’ although, again, if you did not laugh along with it all you were cast aside as ‘boring.’ It was considered a part general life at the men’s club.”

 

Anne

Anne’s Story:

“Many women feel guilty when they ‘complain’ about their bodies or birth stories because they don’t want to sound ungrateful. But sharing your story, including the uncomfortable details, may help you realize that there are many other women to turn to for emotional support.”

As a woman myself I know all too well how often we can cat called or stared it for our choice of outfit. I have decided to try and take 50 individuals street portraits and follow them up with stories about personal situations if they let me. These stories can be to do with anything in their lives that they are willing to share with me. After I innitialy got in contact with the first set of womenn it was aoustaning to see the personal replies I was reciving from people who have never met me before. I would like to compile these images and place them into a book for more women to see that it is ok to talk about issues in their lifes good or bad. I would like to take these images on film to make them less of a throw away item as the stories that follow the portraits will not be dismissed. The #MeToo movement had such a profound effect on my life seeing all these women come together and support one another and let others know they are not alone. I was personally effected by the #MeToo movement when I was 20, and reading others peoples stories letting myself know I was not alone really helped me. No one knows what happened to me when I was younger so I would love to be able to compile images of women who are ready to share their own story and I hope that others enjoy the series as much as I enjoyed creating it.

Nikon f80

These images were taken on a Nikon F80 on a 400 grain film. I found the overall effect of the images too noisy for what I wanted from my final outcome. I wanted the images to be crisp and clear rather than almost a filter over them so I will have to carry on taking images on a Nikon f80 but possibly on 300 grin film to counteract the noise on the images. All of these images were taken at a private event in the open market called swap shop. The type of people that I want to photograph can be found here. I feel like all of these people had a story about them and this is something I wanted to capture. However I would prefer to have a much more documentary style school portrait being able to really capture the people and their expressions at the time of the photo what ever they may be thinking about.

Origin of photography and street photography

Fashion photography can be dated back as far back as the 1850s, where women would pose  in their most elaborate garments for fine art or portrait artists, who would then paint them for influential fashion magazines such as, Vogue. Established in the 1800s and initially illustrated by hand . In 1913 Condé Nast hired the artist Adolphus Meyer as their first photographer, his work was realistic using models for fashion editorials compared to the brush strokes of illustration. As the audience for fashion photography grew, so did the need for fashion to become more easily accessible to the wider public. Magazines started to introduce collaborations with designers and photographers blurring the lines of artist versus designer. Social and political changes arose in the 1970s, displaying changes in social feminist constructs and the way feminism was portrayed in the media. Evidently this had a major impact on the fashion industry following the way photographers involved women in imagery. Before the 1970s women were being mainly represented in magazines as objects simply displaying garments, but the rise of feminism followed the rise of new female photographers. Deborah Turbville started as a fashion editor for Harpers Bazaar. In the 1970s she became a photographer using light and positioning to create a fashion narrative with a darker side than most people at this time were used too, with an emphasis on the female gaze Turbville’s work is dreamlike and delicate. It was said that Turbville turned ‘fashion photography into avant-garde art.’  During the 1970s through to the 1980s an era of overly sexualized imagery began to push the boundaries of ready-to-wear, advertisement campaigns in magazines began to use subversive imagery and noticed a growing industry for fashion photography once more. New sexualized editorials adapted by Turbville were adopted in brands who wanted to have a new perspective on the industry, seeing an artistic photography and commercial work crossover. The human body has been the focus of fashion photography since it began, the camera has been focused on the body for informative and logical scrutiny, in addition to a creative investigation. Imagery often focuses on themes of nudity, growth, decay and beauty. Fashion photography is being used on such a regular basis on a multitude of different platforms, with the power to educate, shock, and entice.

Street photography has always been debated as a medium. Since the beginning of fashion photography, the concept of street photography struggled to be accepted as a true art form. Street photography by definition is photography that is conducted for art or enquiry purposes that feature chance encounters and random incidents.  Photography as a medium, throughout history has been trying to establishing itself against fine art, sculpture alongside other classical art forms. During 1877 the portable camera was first founded, meaning that photographers were now not restricted to the constraints and confinement of a studio. These photographers were suddenly able to travel, capturing life and movement on the streets. New technology flooded the streets, and transportable cameras evidently found themselves within hands of people with little skill or background knowledge within the profession of photography. As progressively more people found themselves access to a camera the threat of privacy in America heightened. During this time in America, the New York Times printed an issue explaining ‘The camera Epidemic’ which referred to street photography as a disease, suggesting these people have contracted ‘Camera Lamina Sicca’ this article stated that ‘no one can feel sure that at any moment a camera has not been brought to bear upon them.’  Then went on to say that ‘Even when walking quietly in the public street a person is not safe, he a constantly made the victim of the instantaneous process by camera.’. Portable cameras became a key topic for discussion in 1900 when Eastman Kodak released a camera the working class could afford, capturing and recording images from everyday life using a form of low cost photography. Susan Sontag writer, director and activist took a keen interest in photography and used her work as a beneficial platform to inform and record historical events. She was described as ‘one of the most influential critics of her generation’.  Her most significant books was On Photography where she writes about the beginning of street photography being accepted as a true art form. In this book, Sontag wrote ‘There is something predatory in the act of taking a picture – to photograph people is to violate them.’

By analysing the article written for the New York Times, in reference to street photography by making someone ‘the victim’ there are similarities made by Sontag where she calls refers to photographers as ‘predatory’. Within street photography, to obtain a candid image, a photographer would normally be hidden to capture someone’s true emotions. Alternatively, to obtain someone’s image without their knowledge is similar to possession without consent. Some people may find this idea distressing, not knowing when your images is being taken, or what the photographer may do with this image. Sontag explains ‘to photograph people is to violate them.’  Within photography, the freedom of a photographers expression and the definition of street photography still remains to capture art and enquire including chance encounters.

The passport photo

I chose to look into the history of the passport photo for the reason of it being a form of formal identity just by a single image of yourself. The passport photo has many different regulations and rules, but this has not always been the case. It is a type of portrait photography and looking into this may broaden my knowledge on the subject. “Although photography had been around for more than half a century, its adoption seems to have caught the authorities by surprise,” says Martin Lloyd, author of The Passport: The History of Man’s Most Travelled Document. “They made no rules on how to pose for a picture. They were simply asked to send one in. So they did.” The passport, the first known English version of which dates back to the early 15th Century, had to be signed by the foreign secretary until 1857 and featured a printed signature afterwards. A further change came in 1920, following a decision by the League of Nations to standardise passports. The blue cardboard-covered British booklet passport, the last of which expired in 2003, came into being. This was designed to prevent excessive folding of the single-sheet version, known to damage enamelled photographs. By 1926, when the second version of the booklet passport was introduced, the requirement was for two duplicate, unmounted photographs printed on thin paper, “full face” showing, with no hats worn, which remains the norm. Pictures had to be a certain size to fit the box provided. This meant an end to the early free-for-all. In 1941, the government specified the photograph size in inches, rather than just “small”. Coin-operated photo booths, with origins as far back as the 1880s, came into wider usage in the 1950s, the same time as mass overseas tourism began, further homogenising passports. “The very precise requirements of the Passport Office mean that passport photos are more standardised than they have ever been since 1915,” says Michael Pritchard, director-general of the Royal Photographic Society. “No smiling, straight-on and white backgrounds don’t provide the flattering images of the traditional High Street photographer and we’ve probably lost something, which is a shame, especially as we all have to live with that image for 10 years.” Smiling was banned in 2004, along with long fringes and dummies in babies’ mouths. Today, passports, which come in the standard burgundy covers used within the European Union, must include colour photographs measuring 45mm by 35mm. There are more than 20 separate stipulations. Part of the reason is the introduction of biometrics – using the distances between facial features for more reliable identification – in 2006. There is slightly more leeway for children, who have had to have passports separate from their parents since 1998. They can still smile, not having to adopt a “neutral” expression. Even so, it’s a long way from the freedoms of 100 years ago.

Documentary Photography and Lisette Model

The definition of documentary style photography is that ‘Documentary photography usually refers to a popular form of photography used to chronicle events or environments both significant and relevant to history and historical events as well as everyday life. It is typically covered in professional photojournalism, or real life reportage, but it may also be an amateur, artistic, or academic pursuit.’
Documentary photography to me is a style of photography that provides a straightforward and accurate representation of people, places, objects and events, and is often used in reportage. Until the mid-twentieth century, documentary photography was a vital way of bearing witness to world events: from shoot-from-the-hip photographs of the Spanish Civil War by Robert Capa to the considered portraits of poor farmers by Dorothea Lange, am image from this series is shown on the right in full bleed. Social documentary photography is a different style all together, During this period the tradition of documentary photography was reinvented. Artists began to see the camera as a tool for social change, using it to shed light on injustice, inequality and the sidelined aspects of society. However, social documentary photography is often a subjective art and not all photographers in this category intend their images to aid the bettering of society. Lisette Model’s who is a portrait photographer used close-up views of people on the streets of Paris, New York and the French Riviera were often taken without the subjects’ awareness or permission her work will be shown later on in my sketchbook. From 1949 onwards, Robert Frank started to take pictures which reflected his search for artistic freedom, shooting stories which revolutionised the expressive potential of the medium.

Lisette Model was born in Vienna, where Model originally studied music specialising in piano and compositional theory where she then decided to move to Paris. She discontinued her musical career in 1933, and discovered photography through her sister Olga and her friend Rogi André. She decided to become a full-time photographer soon after this and in 1937, served a short apprenticeship with Florence Henri. The next year, she and her husband, the painter Evsa Model, immigrated to New York City, where she came into contact with important figures in the photographic community, such as Alexey Brodovitch and Beaumont Newhall. Her photographs were very successful and appeared regularly in Harper’s Bazaar, Cue, and PM Weekly. Model’s best-known work consists of series of photographs she made with a 35-millimeter camera, of people on the Promenade des Anglais in Nice and on the streets of New York’s Lower East Side. Her work is notable for its emphasis on the peculiarities of average people in everyday situations, and for its direct, honest portrayal of modern life and its effect on human character. As one of the most influential street photographers of the 1940s, Model redefined the concept of documentary photography in America, and through her roles of teacher and lecturer she shaped the direction of postwar photography. Like many other documentary style photographers her past history and where Model grew up I believe effected her style of photography, her approach is a lot less abrasive than some other photographers. Her black and white images on a 35mm are soft and delicate capturing a range of colours and emotions within one image. I would like to use some of these techniques within my own work, from the soft closed eyes of the female subject showing a variation of light and shade on the face. I will experiment with a 35mm in my work and see how I like the noise on the image, I think that a 400 film would be better for a portrait as it gives of a grain that most film photographers prefer. Model was an inspiration to my work and I know will be a vital starting point for me approaching people to take their portrait.

Christophe Agou