Objectives:

• Establish coherent and sustainable links between your own practical work with that of historical and contemporary reference.
• Show evidence for an on-going critical and analytical review of your investigation – both your written essay and own practical work in response to research and analysis.

Hypothesis: Possible questions to investigate

Within my personal study, there is evidence of various techniques. These include: Portraiture, Documentation, Landscape, Abstraction and Reflections on Photography (themes of Aesthetics, Codes, Truth, Seeing, Looking)

Questions to consider concluding my overall hypothesis:

Portraiture

Does a portrait tell us more about the person portrayed or the photographer?

Here is a link to an interesting article by Canon, who released a project directed to the relationship between the camera and the person.

Canon Experiment Article – http://petapixel.com/2015/11/04/6-photographers-asked-to-shoot-portraits-of-1-man-with-a-twist/

After reading this article, I strongly believe that a portrait can be re-represented in any way. The photographer is the pivitol force within a photo-shoot. Emphasis to strong stereotyping and styles are reflected throughout the article, but with persuasion photographers perceive an image in a different way, therefore reflecting the photographer more.

Can personality and identity be expressed in a portrait?

Visual Arts –

•  Portraits contain clues about the people pictured in them that can tell us things about the subjects’ cultures, identities, traditions, and roles in society.
• Portraits can express how people think about themselves and their world.
• Portraits can include symbols that reference interesting aspects of the people in them.
• When creating a portrait, an artist makes many artistic choices that affect how we understand the image.
• Artists make choices about media, style, background, and embellishments to visually describe themselves or others

What are the differences/ similarities in a formal or informal approach to portrait photography?

What makes an iconic Photograph?

What are the Influences of the Old Masters and other painters on modern photographic portraiture?

What are the key elements if Portraiture and Intimacy?

How Can Photography reflect inner emotions such as fear and isolation?

Documentary and Street photography:

Is it possible for photography to capture moments in time objectively and truthfully?

Examining the documentary aesthetics: A photograph should not be manipulated, so that its authenticity, veracity and sense of realism can be maintained?

What is the relationship between photography and realism?

How can photography bear witness to the ways of life and events of the world?

What is the relationship between Henri Cartier-Bresson’s theory of the ‘decisive moment’ and subjectivity?

What are the intentions of Voyeurism and the nature of observation and intervention in documentary photography?

Landscape photography

Issues in Landscape Photography: Romantic or idyllic representation of nature vs culture and the man-made world.

What is beauty in landscape photography?

How does people control, interact and construct the environment in which they live?

In what way has the work of Ansel Adams influenced Joe Cornish?

To what extent could the work of Ansel Adams be considered spiritual?

What is the Meaning behind William Eggleston?

How Is William Eggleston At War With The Obvious?

What was so different about the ‘New Topography’ exhibition in 1975?

Two Photographers, One Aim: Preserving nature. Looking at the different approaches to landscape photography between Ansel Adams and Robert Adams.

Abstraction:

Two photographers, one aim: Looking at the different approaches to abstract photography between Eliot Porter and Aaron Siskind.

In what way can abstraction make visible what is invisible in the natural and urban landscape?

Reflections on Photography; Aesthetics, Codes, Truth, Seeing, Looking

Examining the documentary aesthetics: A photograph should not be manipulated, so that its authenticity, veracity and sense of realism can be maintained?