‘Camera Lucida’ is a book published in 1980 by a French philosopher Roland Barthes. It is an exploration of into the essence of photography, as well as a eulogy of Bathes’ late mother. Barthes considers photography to have just as much effect on the body as on the mind. It discusses the lasting emotional effects on particular photographs. What does one simply learn from ‘Camera Lucida’? Barthes was not interested or concerned with the technique of photography. In the book he focuses on two planes of images. The first is called studium, it is the context and meaning of the photograph; culture, history and art. ‘The studium is a kind of education.’ The second is called punctum, it is the part of the photograph which captures our attention and consumes the audience, it does not belittle down to a specific meaning or kind of beauty. Every photograph for Barthes is a memorial. 

Personally, Barthes’ interpretation and perception of photography highlights the detail of photographs. He does not care for the technical side of photography but only gives importance to the meaning and the aspects of the art which completely and utterly consume us. I think this translates to my project very easily, the photographs I am taking concentrate on the emotions and feelings you can have from an image. Photographs are very powerful and personal when individuals gain a connection with them. 

The photograph unclassifiable: Barthes believes photographs cannot be classified regarding movements, subject matter or style because all are external to the subject itself and can in turn be be applied to any other art or image. The photograph always points or leads back to the subject. ‘…a weightless transparent envelope.’ Barthes views photography as belonging to a category of ‘laminated objects’ which cannot be divided from one another without having to destroy both parts. 

‘in order to see a photograph well, it is best to look away or close your eyes…’

‘He is allergic to cleverness in photography…’

http://www.nytimes.com/1981/08/23/books/death-in-the-photograph.html?pagewanted=all

Femen is a group of topless female activists who originated from Ukraine. They have become internationally known for organising some controversial topless protests against homophobia, sexism, religious institutions, sex tourism and other social topics internationally and nationally. The group have recently relocated and are now based in France, Paris. These women have regularly been detained by police due to their activism and are using sextremism to protect women’s rights. Inna Shevchenko is the leader of the Femen movement, demonstrating topless against what these women perceive as manifestations of patriarch, dictatorship, religion and the sex industry. Shevchenko has a higher profile than most members in the group as was one of the three Femen activists who were kidnapped and threatened by the Belarus KGB in 2011 (Soviet Union security) and also brought around more attention when in Ukraine by cutting down, with a chainsaw, a 4-metre high Christian cows in central Kiev in 2012.

About Femen: femen.org/about-us/

Inna Shevchenko’s website: http://www.inna-shevchenko.com

Article about Femen and topless protest: https://www.opendemocracy.net/5050/zoe-holman/sextremism-really-as-radical-as-they-think

The Guardian articles on Femen: http://www.theguardian.com/world/femen

The article above talks more in-depth about the Femen movement and their methods of topless protest to try and emancipate women and to liberate them. This has much controversy around the world and especially throughout the Muslim community where Muslim women go against the claims that they are to be liberated and free by being naked. I feel that this will forever be an ongoing debate as so many women feel differently about what freedom means to them. I believe that Muslim women can do and where whatever they please but the whole point of them coving up is so that they are ‘saved’ for their husbands and are only allowed to show their bodies to their husband because they belong to them. This is why I have somewhat of a problem with Muslim culture as women are treated as second class citizens and are expected not to work or have jobs that the men have and the fact that they raised to believe that their body should only be seen by their husband. The whole controversy with Femen is that these women want freedom in the sense that a woman can do whatever she wants with her body and shouldn’t feel trapped by the clothes that she wears or she shouldn’t wear certain clothing as her husband or partner won’t like it or allow her to do so. The whole message behind the movement of Femen is to do what YOU want with your own body and to choose whether you want to wear layers of clothing or wear barely anything and not be judged by other people and bashed or shamed.

“Where the female body – through its societal projections in media, art, politics and religion – has always formed the first port of women’s oppression” – Zoe Holman

What is sex tourism?

Sex tourism is where someone will go travelling to engage in sexual activity, mainly prostitutes. A definition of sex tourism given by the World Tourism Organisation states that sex tourism is made up of trips that are organised from within the tourist sector, using its structures and networks, with the primary purpose of effecting a commercial sexual relationship by the tourist with residents at the destination. This is basically using women [and possibly men] as objets and using their bodies to have a ‘better’ time and experience while travelling. This is absolutely ridiculous and disgusting that people actually go out and do this. Sex tourism also brings in lower costs for sexual services in the destination country, this is because prostitution is either legal in those countries or there are indifferent law enforcements and access to child prostitution. I think that this is seriously awful and am so glad that the women part of the Femen movement are strongly against this and are fighting for this to end.

Above is a short video of the women from Femen peeing on an image of Putin. This is such a strong message showing complete disrespect towards that man and that they don’t care what he thinks because in their eyes Putin is running a dictator ship and they hate him. This work really stands out one because the women are topless with messages written across their bare bodies and the second being them peeing on the President of Russia’s photograph. I’m unsure how I feel about this as I am all for equality of the sexes and women should be able to peaceful walk around topless without being objectified or ridiculed in public etc yet some part of me thinks that peeing in public on the streets is a step too far. There are many ways to get the message across to the media and to Putin about their strong hatred towards him but there is a certain point where I would have to draw the line as this isn’t going to get through to him or anyone else any more than burning a photograph of Putin would.

The Guardian article on Femen: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/mar/20/naked-female-warrior-femen-topless-protesters

About | Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ward

Phelps was an early feminist American author who challenged traditional Christian beliefs of the afterlife, challenging women’s traditional roles in marriage and family. She was also an advocate for clothing reform for women. Phelps went against convention and married a man 17 years younger than her. Later in life she would urge women to burn their corsets in protest against the stereotypes and norms faced with women. Her later writing focused on feminine ideals and women’s financial dependence. She became the first woman to present a lecture series at Boston University. Phelps work aims to challenge the view that women’s pale and fulfilment resided in the home. Her work instead depicted women as succeeding in less traditional careers taking on jobs such as ministers, artists and physicians.

Bra Burning | 1960s

The 1960s was the beginning of a new era for women where protests for equal rights really began. Before the 60s women were always known to be housewives and mothers without any other sort of titles, they were simply there to serve. Many women were aggravated by this and still are today, this made women feel the need to reform this stereotype. With the 60s came the bra burning phrase were some women would literally burn their bras as they felt that it made a statement and a stand for Women’s Rights. Few women actually did this but many women supported the movement itself. They burned bras as a symbol showing independence of men at the time. Other women would often walk around wearing no bra at all again to show independence of men. To many women this meant freedom. The Femen women took inspiration from this and have taken it to a new level where they walk around topless and have things written on their bare bodies.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NnEfnxUm4xs

About the ‘bare-all approach’: 

This approach is what got the women of Femen noticed as simply wearing colourful clothing or underwear seemingly didn’t excite journalists and so the only way to get noticed was to go around topless. One founding member stated that “journalists weren’t interested… we realised we had to do something more radical”. These women felt that they needed to do something out of the ordinary to actually get noticed and for people to consider them. This is an interesting idea as these women show confidence and strength being able to show themselves out in public when many other women would be too afraid of others shaming them or getting dirty looks from them.

Femen at a Muslim conference (France):

Overview | What I Think 

I get what the women of Femen are standing for and what their message is but that is only because I’ve researched into it at bit more otherwise I don’t think that I would have got what they are doing. I’m really unsure where to stand in this situation as I completely agree that women should have the freedom to do whatever they want with their bodies and can do whatever they want with their own bodies but again not a lot of people would see that. All they see is a bunch of Ukrainian women going against the government and Vladimir Putin. They do have strong and easy to understand messages but I just don’t think that many people will see it that way and won’t really care to find out more about these women and the movement behind their activism. Their bare skin is more of a statement and what stands out most over any writing that may be on their body and I just think that peeing on photographs of Putin is a step too far and cutting down a sacred stand is also a bit much as that is where it becomes disrespectful of other peoples views and it will make them blind to the Femen women’s opinions and make people less inclined to actually listen to what they have to say. I do know that their circumstances are very different and they are living in a completely different world to me and people living in Britain and America where women’s rights are actually taken more seriously and people are starting to start the push for equality, in Ukraine and Russia women are still very much second class citizens and the women of Femen also focus on Muslim women and ‘freeing’ themselves by taking their clothes off etc. Feminism is such a huge topic and movement where women all over the world are being suppressed and different parts of the world are at different stages of equality and different levels of knowledge and understanding on the subject. The women of Femen and Pussy Riots seem to be on the same wave length and a lot of their work blends well together and they are able to relate to one another.

About | Pussy Riots

Pussy Riot is a Russian feminist punk rock protest group based in Moscow. They were founded back in 2011 consisting of 11 women from the ages of about 20 to 33. These women stage unauthorised and provocative performances in unusual public locations, they are edited into music videos and are posted over the internet. Their work within music contains themes including feminism LGBT right and political messages in opposition to Vladimir Putin, the Russian President. They see Putin as a dictator and very much bringing back socialism and the dictatorship rule of Lenin and Stalin back in the early 1900s. Two members of the Pussy Riot band faced imprisonment without bail and were unable to see their young children the entire time that they were there. One of the pair went of hunger strike due to abuse by police while in prison. They were released in December of 2013 due to the Winter Olympics being hosted by Russia in February of 2014. This was done to save unrest and possible protest. This didn’t stop the women, as soon as they were released from prison they went out to make another music video and performed under an Olympic sign only to be pepper sprayed and hit down by police. This just makes the group stronger and give them more to fight for.

Pussy Riot Russian Orthodox Church performance: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grEBLskpDWQ

Interview with Pussy Riot: 

Articles about the Pussy Riots: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/news/pussy-riot-protest/

Article about Orthodox church and Pussy Riots: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/apr/22/russians-support-orthodox-church-pussy-riot

Researching more into their work I came across this video showing five female members and one male member of the band doing an impromptu performance under a sign for the Olympics. Basically, these members were attacked by police officers, pepper sprayed and whipped. It was actually shocking to me because it is so obviously that these supposed law enforcers were trying to silence these people for standing out and not even doing anything wrong at all. Police brutality is such a huge part of American news reports showing how police are taking their power for granted and abusing it. Yet in Russia I don’t even think that they get any media or news coverage at all because so many people are against their movement and anti-Putin protests.

Article on Pussy Riot’s prison sentencing: http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/putins-religious-war-against-pussy-riot

This video is very interesting to me. It is a video where two members of the Pussy Riot are being buried alive and are wearing Russian riot police uniforms during the violent clashes between police and protectors in a fight for change in Russia. Towards the end of the video is also a quote from an American black man who was taken by a police officer and killed. This video emulates police brutality and shows two women actually being buried alive with the expectation that they are just supposed to lay there and allow for them to be buried alive which symbolises the suppression that people are faced with every single day in countries all over the world. This was the Pussy Riot’s first english song to be released and by doing so they have given more room to freely express themselves and branch out to a wider audience especially people living in America where they have made the link near the end of the video with the quote from Eric Garner shortly before his death. I do think that reaching out to other countries like America and Britain the Pussy Riot’s will gain more following and backing as from watching many of their videos and reading comments I have found how backward a lot of Russian people’s views are and how they seem to hate feminism and this band and anything that is anti-Putin or against their beloved orthodox church. This video also helped me to realise how politically driven these women are and how much their work is against their own countries way of life. I think that these women are very strong and courageous to be standing out against what literally everyone else believes in and the fact that they are even going against their leader Putin. I hate that these women have to do stuff like this to be noticed and to try and make a change but I guess nothing will ever change if people don’t stand up and acknowledge that there is a problem and that something needs to change. The two women featured in the video seem to have become the face of the Pussy Riots who were originally supposed to remain faceless yet this had to come after their prison sentence where they were named and photographed without their balaclavas on.

This is another of the Pussy Riot’s music videos showing the brutality they are faced by the police. Their work is strongly politically driven and they remain faceless wearing balaclavas to hide their identities. To me this becomes more of a representation for women so that people follow the movement rather than any individual involved within the movement. This video also shows how these women get physically abused and just take it, this reminds me of peaceful protests made by Ghandi on the rights of the Indian people. It is so strange to see these people being hit down in the streets with passersby just watching and filming, allowing it all to unfold. Police brutality is so known and common in America where black citizens are usually targeted but in Russia the women are targeted and anyone that thinks differently. There are always going to be people that defy your views and people are always going to disagree with you no matter what so protesting is always going to be going on and people are always going to be fighting for change. Peaceful protest seems to work and it makes more of an impact if these people are going about making their music videos and with the police acting violently they are giving them exactly what they want. This is more likely to push for change and get the rest of the world talking about issues such as violence against black citizens for being the colour that they are and against women simply for being born a woman.

Pussy Riot and Femen article:  

Madonna’s speech in Russia, Moscow on the rights of human beings: 

This is probably the best thing I’ve ever heard Madonna say. I feel that there are so many supporters of the Pussy Riot’s but they are in fear of standing out or showing their support because they will be faced with police brutality and a never ending veil of hatred. Support comes more from those who understand what feminism is. I feel that a lot of Russian people hate the Pussy Riot group because they see their movement as a crime against the orthodox church when in reality they are actually against Putin and the support that the orthodox church has given him in his rule and have almost been taken over and corrupt by Vladimir Putin. Their lyrics are explicitly against Putin and talk about the “virgin birth-giver of God” taking him away and ridding Russia of him. These women weren’t making a music video against the Russian Putin. They are very politically driven and the messages within their music is strong and clear but so many Russians choose to ignore their message and are ignorant to what they are really trying to say. Reading more into the lyrics of this song the women are begging almost the virgin Mary to become a feminist and to take away from the church who praises “rotten leaders”. Their words and lyrics portray Putin as ruining the purity of the church and the Virgin Mary as a feminist who is with those women when they are protesting.

“42 percent of Russians consider the punk prayer an attack on the Russian Orthodox Church.” – Levada Center

Article about Russian Orthodox Church with translated lyrics:   http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/11/what-pussy-riots-punk-prayer-really-said/264562/

Pussy Riot story so far:  http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-25490161

Getting inspired | Spring Breakers

A couple of years ago a film came out starring Vanessa Hudgens, Selena Gomez and James Franco about a bunch of teenage women who went out on Spring break and things went very differently and wild radical things happened. I haven’t seen the film myself but have researched into it and been told by friends that the film is very radical and crazy with the women attempting a heist and eventually being arrested. Images coming from the film really remind me of the Pussy Riots with the colourful and prominent balaclavas being a huge part of the film as well as an iconic symbol of the Pussy Riot band and movement. I feel like the creators of the film took inspiration from the radical women that are the Pussy Riots and found them so interesting and they really do stand out and have a clear and strong message which the producers and director of the film could want to adopt for their characters. This could be a happy coincidence but the colourful balaclavas are associated with the Pussy Riots and so it does remind me of the film Spring Breakers. Also, in the film Spring Breakers the young women are constantly just wearing bikinis and balaclavas which is also similar to the movement of Femen where the women go out topless with writing all over their bodies in protest. I think that the film Spring Breakers can be related to these two movements within feminism as I think of them when I see images from the film.

Overview | What I Think

It has given me a lot to think about after researching the movement of the Pussy Riot band and it interests me how their world is so different from mine and the fact that they get beaten down and just take it in order to show the world what is going on in their own world and their lives as women living in Russia. This is a really strong movement with a strong group of women who stand up for what they believe in and are unapologetic. Their work shows a different side to police brutality from what I am exposed to as a young female showing that not only police brutality in America against black citizens but also police brutality targets women too. To me this shows how far a country and government will go just to silence people and to try and stop them from going against the norm and for thinking differently. It is crazy the lengths a government will go just to stop people challenging them or becoming opposition to them.

Hate comments

With news coverage and acknowledgement comes hatred and trolls. After watching one of the Pussy Riots videos I scrolled through the comments and found nothing but hate for those women. People were actually saying that they women deserved to be beaten and whipped and were ‘feminazi’. That is such a strong accusation and completely stupid as they women aren’t killing anyone and don’t believe in a superior race, they believe in equality and they are the ones being thrown about and beaten to the ground. I understand that there are many people in Russia and other countries that have been brought up to believe that women are second class citizens and are to be treated less than men but somehow they have lost all sense of respect for others opinions and views. They seem to think that they are the only ones that can feel and they have succumb to thinking in the same way and these women have dared to stand up against that way of thinking and are expressing their own views and those views are for the equal rights of women to men. The main reason these women are hated is because they go against the rule of Vladimir Putin and are seemingly against the Russian Orthodox Church. I get that people can be really strongly religious and keep to their beliefs but others are allowed opposing opinions and should be able to voice those opinions just as those who are religious are. I don’t really know where I stand in this situation as I am completely against the hatred and stupidity of anonymous online accounts yet I do think that disrespecting someone else’s belief’s or religion can be a possible step too far just for some attention and to go against Putin.