Looking back to my statement of intent, I’ve developed and grew into my concept a lot more than I ever anticipated, I think the previous foundations and research I had done for my dissertation.

Unfortunately I was unable to go to Amsterdam in the end as of work commitments, I feel this would have allowed me to see first hand how women feel working in the sex industry and take interviews away from that experience to build a stronger basis incorporating it into my final concept of the Female Gaze.

On the surface this project doesn’t relate however I came up with the idea of looking into the Female Gaze when looking through Glamour magazines rebranded first issue and it occurred to me that we judge and look at other women the way men do. Scrutinising over lumps, bumps, spots who wears what the best and looks the ‘hottest’ when in reality we should be encouraging each others flaws and imperfections. As more times than not other women struggle with the same issues making them more normal and natural than ‘unsightly’.

I found that when looking closer at the Fashion industry women are continually portrayed through the Male Gaze, especially in retail advertising and marketing. Encouraging women to buy into a life where men find them attractive and they fulfil the female beauty ideal.

This is where I got my start point from combining that with my interest in Playboy magazine that I focused on for my dissertation I felt I had a strong starting point.

The exhibitions I discussed in my statement of intent I did visit however didn’t necessarily feel once I had developed my idea beyond the statement of intent, they seemed not irrelevant but to be going down a different scientific path than the one I was looking at with gender studies.

With my gant chart I checked back to it to reference and make sure I hadn’t missed anything/was keeping on track however I did not meet the majority of deadlines and in the end ignored the time like all together. I found it was mostly unrealistic time deadlines which just weren’t attainable.

I feel there are definitely areas of my project that I could improve on and have gone more in depth, doing more photoshoots and incorporating a larger variety of illustrations in my final.

I am however extremely pleased with my exhibition board as I wanted to create a minimalist artist wall as if in someones living room, adding an additional plant to give it more depth and aesthetically pleasing look.

I found this project challenging at times however I think I handled all that it had to throw at me creating a consistent, coherent brand identity along with work that I’m proud of.

Well the time has come, it’s shoot time.

I think I’m gonna do three shoots, from all my research I’ve come up with three themes.

Are you ready?

We’ve got a bedroom situation going in one, I’m going to add in the addition of a flower or multiple flowers. I want this to reinforce the femininity of the photographs. I want to have an array of photographs of various areas of the body that are deemed sexually arousing/erotic and take a natural photo showing their unfemininity if you will. The hair, the stretchmarks, the skin tags, the rolls of fat, the things deemed most unsightly. I want this photoshoot to have an ethereal almost feel to it.

For all of my photoshoots I’m going to use natural lighting, I want it to feel natural and personal.

The second I’m feeling water, also an inclusion of flowers in this one. Creating an opaque water to only show parts of the body that are protruding out. This should hopefully emphasise the figure, drawing attention to certain areas of the body. I’m hoping the water and light will reflect giving me a really nice effect across the body.

For my final idea, I thought of something quitter (quite literally) stretchmarks with my liquid copper leaf, painting over the mark on the skin leaving a beautiful copper shimmer. I want to do this to convey the message that imperfections are to be celebrated and that they are beautiful. It will be on selective parts of the body, having a zoomed in aesthetic.

I’m hoping these all work out well as I want to show a variation through the photography for my final project, so fingers crossed!

So Girl on Girl is so perfect for this project, the variation of artist’s featured alongside the depth and diversity of the work is just ideal for my research.

Can’t stop, won’t stop talking about it.

As this is just early days (she says 2 months in) for my project and I haven’t really found my feet yet in regards to my final outcome or even experimentation. Because I’ve looked a lot at photographers I am quite inspired to do a couple of photoshoots.

I like how intimate a lot of the work I’ve been researching is, not necessarily in a erotic way but an intimate personal connection. I want to take this forward and develop on this concept through some photography of my own.

I would like to use a film camera in an ideal world just as it adds another layer of intimacy. I don’t know why and I don’t know if it’s just me that feels that way, but having the photograph so raw and unedited gives it an element of vulnerability.

I’m not sure if I actually will use film, it’s been a while and I’ll have to brush up on EVERYTHING, but I would really like to include it.

In terms of my first photoshoot, I’m hoping to just experiment with the body and manipulate it into different shapes to create more abstract photos. With the editing I want to crop them down to make you have to look at the photo for longer to understand what it is, not know immediately by just a glance.

I hope to have my photography like this as I feel bodies especially women’s bodies deserve so much more appreciation for what they are.

I’m trying to get on it with research from quite early on so it gives me inspiration and ideas earlier so I can start piecing together my final outcome.

I want to look at books not just artists to give more depth to my project, for my dissertation I looked at Playboy which I’ve already started doing my research on, I want to continue looking at Playboy but incorporate more books. I think Naomi Wolfe The Beauty Myth will lend itself very well to this project, alongside Simone De Bouvoire the Second Sex, this is a more social studies literary book however I think it’s good to do varied and more academic research as well.

I’ve also looked into some other gender studies books including Gender, Nature and Nurture by Richard A. Lippa which discusses how nature informs societal roles and how each gender assumes their stereotypical role.

As I’m hoping to narrow down my focus onto The Female Gaze comparing that to the Male Gaze and looking into the fundamentals surrounding Female Gaze, theories, social studies, feminist writings but also writings that contradict and disagree.

I’ve began looking already into the Three Waves of Feminism, I think I need to study this and research this more, especially disagreements people have with the most current Third Wave. During my first project (Creative Research) I focused on the Woman’s Marches, I think this is very much relevant to this project.

This kind of research where I’m not just focusing on the creative side of my project but delving deeper into academic references will help round my project off and give me a better understanding of what I’m doing and why I’m doing it.

I’m getting quite stuck thinking about how I’m going to start doing work and stop completely focusing on research.

I love illustration and that’s what I want to focus on in my work however I’m not sure how to incorporate it or how to make my outcome more than just a few illustrations. It needs to have depth and variety which at this point I’m just not sure how to do that.

I’m hoping to do some photography but I haven’t decided how much of a serious photoshoot I’m going to do or if I just take some photos to use in some mix media illustrations.

I’m not so much thinking of my final outcome I’m more so thinking of my experimentation and linking it in with my research.

I’m still looking at Playboy, even though it’s at the start of my sketchbook it is a constant reference I’m using. With it being so heavily photography based that’s what’s making me consider doing a photoshoot but I’m not sure how good my skills are to produce something that wouldn’t look horrendous.

I’m gonna try just experimenting with some illustration work and see where it takes me!