Tagged: diversity

diversity now!: evaluation

For my response to the Diversity Now brief, I wanted to create a piece of work that built upon my previously explored interests and talents to end up with something that could still fit within my personal portfolio. As much of my work tends to focus on aspects of femininity and youth I focused my piece on women and girls and the diversity of appearance and style, to send out the message that there is not only one kind of beauty, or one “look” that is acceptable or fashionable. ­­

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portraits of girls: diversity in beauty


I wanted to shoot images of females with varying appearances, whether that be simply facially, in body shape, race/ethnicity or style. I chose several subjects that all had very different and unique appearances and shot a series of portraits. I let the models direct themselves and have fun with the shoot as I wanted these photos to show diversity in appearance, style and personality, rather than be a strictly directed and staged fashion shoot. I also kept make-up very minimal and did not use post-production enhancements except to correct lighting/colour as I shot in natural light to give a softer, more feminine feel to the images.

Inspired by the phrase ‘oranges are not the only fruit’ I made this my own by basing my photos around the phrase ‘roses are not the only flower’, which has references to femininity as well as roses referencing an ‘English rose’ appearance that is typically attractive in the Western world. For this reason I included other ethnicities, complexions and facial features to show the diversity in appearance and how female beauty is not limited to one type of look.

diversity now: female bodies

After initial visual research into other artists’ work and possible directions, I decided to focus my response to the Diversity Now brief towards women and the variations in bodies, style and appearance. I want to specifically challenge the attitude the fashion industry has towards flaws, imperfections, different body types and body choices, e.g. the (lack of) acceptance of body hair, tattoos, piercings and even skin/body differences that cannot be helped.

 

diversity now: collage workshop

In our collage workshop I started thinking about themes within “Diversity” that I could explore. I found myself selecting images around body standards, sexuality and gender as those are often areas I enjoy discussing and challenging. This first collage was very minimal but I think it worked best this way as it had a strong enough visual message with just the two images, creating a theme of masculinity and sexuality, and the idealized body.

In this piece of collage I focused more on the female body, slicing the body to resemble the pig image next to it. I wanted to create a thoughtful message around women’s body shapes; our lack of confidence with our bodies and our desire to constantly change ourselves. However the pig illustration also touches on how women’s bodies are seen as meat or something desirable, to be consumed. I experimented with stitching into the collage which I had not thought of before but I really feel it has the ability to add to what you are trying to say with an image.

This expanded on the discussion of the sexualisation of women’s bodies. Although very simple again in composition, I think I was able to create a strong message, aided by the addition of type and sewing.