photobook design

February 3, 2016 Jessica Freire 1 Comment

Where Mimosa Bloom – Rita Puig – Serra Costa

Mimosa trees bloom clusters of bright yellow flowers each spring in Rita Puig-Serra Costa’s native city of Barcelona. They grow asymmetrically tall though not often, as the one in her family’s garden. This photo book is about Rita’s mother who passed away with an illness. In her essay she said to cope with her mothers death she ” thought of you as a plant that had got sick and dried out”. This suggests to me that Rita used the mimosa tree as a form of symbiosis of what happened to her mother.

I choose this book as an inspiration for my photo book design because we are both female photographers with a similar background photographing our mothers although the context is different. I also like the way that she has laid out the book. At the beginning of the book there are window cut outs which as you turn each page reveals a thumbnail sized portrait, after meeting all the family members it creates a family tree. I think this is a really creative way and much more interesting way of ‘introducing’ each family member to the viewer. Through out the book she has included archival material such as letters and old photographs which adds another layer to the story. I also like how for every portrait of her family members, on the other side there is an object although their is no explanation I assumed there is a connection between the item and the person in the portrait. Often the person in the portrait is wearing the same colour even if its only a bit as the colour of their object this also make it appealing to the eye.

Another thing I picked up on was the picture of a small bird in someones hand.The photograph was full bleed over two pages which suggests that this photograph is important. At first I didn’t understand why it was there because it didn’t fit in with the sequencing of the photographs. However after doing more research I found that when Rita got asked about this photography and why she choose to incorporate it into her book she said “When she died, I felt like a bird whose mother had abandoned the nest. I had to learn how to fly on my own” again Rita has used symbolism to get her feelings across.

Experimentation, Planning, Research

Stereotypes | Research

February 2, 2016 Shannon O'Donnell Leave a comment

Why stereotypes?

I think that I want to create another short film with a voice over sharing my thoughts on feminism and what it means to me. I want to create an effective video to go along with it and put a visual aspect to what I say. I think that this is a good idea, although it will be a challenge to get it all done in such a short space of time. I wanted to do some added research into my work to make sure that it is accurate. I think that this is pivotal in making an effective piece of work and something that my spectators and audiences are able to really connect with and understand. I went deeper into researching about certain stereotyped groups of people. This was important for the creation of a video that I am creating as it really included all kinds of people and allows my spectator/audience to really get the concept and the meaning behind my work and the movement that I am a part of. One group of people that I wanted to focus on was the black female community, specifically how they need to style their hair to maintain its condition. I find black culture so interesting and want to embrace it myself as well as obviously standing up for the rights of black people too. I find it important for those who are faced with suppression to come together and realise that we are all in it together just at different levels. I also wanted to focus on gay people and the stereotypes that are thrown at them and how being gay seems to label you and put you into a bracket which to me is totally wrong and shouldn’t be the case. I also wanted to work on how transgender people feel within our community and the way that for so many years transgender people, more than others, are being suppressed and made to hide their true selfs and their most authentic selfs. I find all of these people so important in understanding the inequalities of our society and wanted to add this into my work as part of a short film that I am planning on making. I really do believe that the road to equality comes when we realise that we are not alone and that our culture and our being doesn’t need to clash but it can come together to fight suppression. This research is for a small segment of a short film that I will be making which I have decided is going to be my main project and will be getting stills of to create my final book.

How To | Head Wrap

For this particular shoot I wanted to highlight how many white people are happy enough to stand up for black culture yet when it comes to standing up for black lives they take a backseat and don’t want to cause any trouble. I chose the head wrap as I find that it is a clear symbol of black culture and I want my spectators/audience to be able to clearly identify that. This will be a part of a short film that I am currently creating which gives mention to the suppression of black people. I find head wraps so beautiful and think that it makes women of colour look so unique and to me really embraces their culture. After reading more into the reasoning behind the head wrap I really got to grips with just how much of black African culture it represents. The use of the head wrap is to give the hair a break and so that hair can go through deep conditioning, something that black women have to do to maintain their hair. I wanted to embrace this in my work and to really get it right and so I went looking for videos on how to do a proper head wrap. This was really interesting to research and to watch how easy it is to actually do a head wrap yet to me it looks so well put together. Here is a video that really helped me when it came to doing a head wrap on my own head.

Gay stereotypes

There are so many stereotypes within our society today and a lot of those stereotypes come from film or generalisations. I find that movies will often mimic a gay person for comic effect and will over exaggerate a gay person to make it easier for the audience to identify them as ‘the gay one’. I feel that these generic stereotypes have seeped into our society and now people actually think that all gay people are a certain way and have specific attributes. I find this so ridiculous as a sexual preference should not define you as a human being and it shouldn’t be a dominant factor in what you are like as a person. People seem to use these stereotypes to belittle gay people and to put them into a specific box that traps them and often I find that gay people are suppressed. It takes some people so long to ‘come out’ as gay and to actually tell people that they are attracted to the same sex. I really feel that with a lot of people there is a block of what they understand of gay people and think that the movies that they watch portray what gay people are like when in fact you shouldn’t be putting gay people into one category as they are just people who are attracted to the same sex.

Transgender | What it’s like

I really wanted to get what it is like to be transgender more so that I am able to successful portray my character in such a way that will represent this. I am intrigued with transgender people as it seems like such a hard place to be in and can be so isolated at times as I get the feeling that there is a lot of fighting going on in your own head of what is right and wrong and how gender should be. We tend to focus ourselves on how we should look, a woman should look one way and a man should look another way, limiting how people are expected to be. For me transgender people are trapped inside the wrong body, they aren’t authentically themselves if they remain trapped and if they conform to what is expected of them within society. I really want to be able to express the suppression that many transgender people go through as they are not given equal opportunities and people seem to turn a blind eye and think that it’s ‘just a phase’. Funny how our society has really only started to accept gay people over the past few years and they were labelled with the same thing, ‘just a phase’. I want to show how being transgender isn’t a phase and that people actually struggle through and are suppressed by our society.

My response | Experimentation

Originally this work was going to be a part of a short film that I wanted to create but I have now reshaped my idea and will no longer need this content for it but I wanted to post it anyway as this experimentation has helped inform my final project and has helped me to develop my skills with staged images, props and creating different and unique personas. I find this work to be exciting and will get my spectator thinking. This idea came from a short speech that I made with the intent of creating a short film adding in clips over the audio to visualize what I was saying. However, this idea isn’t too relevant to my other work and I feel that, although would have been good, isn’t necessary in my final project.

Experimentation, Research

Photo Book Influences and Ideas: Rita Puig-Serra Costa

February 2, 2016 Flora Devenport Leave a comment

https://player.vimeo.com/video/99219686?title=0&byline=0&portrait=0&color=edea15

This is a video demonstrating the page by page layout of Rita Puig-Serra Costa’s book “Where Mimosa Bloom”. As you can see from the video, Rita’s style of layout sparks essence of formal and non-formal themes. As you can see below, the hard cover first page displays a large image, cutting off the boarder and in effect drawing the reader in as the image erupts the ‘gutter’ and indents on the book.

In contrast, Rita’s work sometimes changes throughout the book, for example, when the pages are sometimes broken up by a blank page or text. This technique can usually done to make the story more interesting, and simply creates anticipation for the reader as they are wondering what is going to appear next. Rita’s simplistic style co-ordinates her archaic photographs, the simple image similarly makes a larger impact by the focus the pages have on them.

Book creation, Evaluation

PHOTOBOOK DESIGN

February 2, 2016 Jemma Hosegood 2 Comments

Task 2: Research the examples of books that have been produced, consider the size and style that you would like to work with. There are many example within the blurb site but feel free to find examples either in school or elsewhere. Produce a mood-board of some of your choices, select two of three examples and explain your thoughts and why the design, look and feel works for your images.

The photobook I have taken inspiration from is Phillip Toledanos – When i was six. This book is also the book from which i gained my contextual inspiration aswell.

The design of the book is quite ‘scrap booky’ as the hard back cover is material and covered with white spots and childish writing announcing the cover.

When making a photobook it is important to think about all of the ‘characteristics’ of the photobook in order to get an idea of what it will look like. Eg: size, shape, texture, colors, photolayouts and photo sizes. All of these factors can change the feel of the book and the images themselves. The layout of the majority of toledanos book is full bleed images and contrasting lights seen in the images. The size of the book ‘When i was six’ is standard landscape. The images are single page. The cover is a hardback material cover, The paper in the book ranges from standard photograph paper to grainy textured paper. Throughout the book there are also shortened pages added in, to draw attention to that page and to break the book up.

Research

Modern Day Feminism

February 1, 2016 Shannon O'Donnell Leave a comment

Modern day feminism, we now live in a world where women have more rights than ever before yet we are constantly suppressed and still face inequalities within our society, politically and economically. Feminism will always remain within our societies as it is something that needs to be fought and people need to be enlightened to. Until both men and women are treated equally within every society on the planet feminism will remain. It is a huge part of many peoples lives, some are against it and don’t really know anything about it and so resort to belittling it and undermining it as they seem to fear it. People often don’t know about feminism and the movement behind it so they bash it thinking that feminists are a bunch of middle aged women with hair arm pits, who don’t wear bras and hate men. This is the complete opposite of what feminists stand for and what feminism is all about. We aren’t here to say that men aren’t as good as women or that women should be running the world and make men see how it feels to be suppressed and belittled by the opposite sex. Feminism is looking for equality, for men and women to live equally among each other and for women to be seen as human beings and equals rather than as objects or less human because of their sex. We need to understand that slut shaming isn’t acceptable and the double standards placed on men and women is so wrong and unjustifiable. As a modern and supposedly more educated society we need to realise that wanting equality isn’t a bad thing and feeling that women are suppressed is actually happening. Across the world we are at different stages of feminism, some are fighting for the right to vote like in Saudi Arabia (up until 2015) and Vatican City, some are fighting for the right to their education in places like Nigeria and Pakistan and many women are fighting for equal pay and equal standards within society. Feminism is such a huge topic and there is still so much to fight for and to stand for, it just takes someone to stand out and want to make that change and want to make the world and much better and equal place.

“I’ve always considered myself a feminist, although I was always afraid of that word because people put so much on it, when honestly, it’s very simple. It’s just a person that believes in equality for men and women.” – Beyonce Knowles Carter

Modern day feminism is continuously growing and different issues and inequalities are coming up daily. Women across the world are being singled out purely because of their sex especially now in Europe, women are beginning to stand up against the way women are treated. For example, the Pussy Riot band in Russia go against Putin and make songs exclusively aimed at Putin himself. Another modern feminist group are the Femen group, an organisation of young women from the Ukraine who protest around with no tops on. Feminism is forever growing and more and more people are becoming aware of this. A news paper article that I have read recently, written by Rachel Spence, on feminism within art nowadays. ‘Women in art | Exhibitions held together purely by gender may be inadequate, even distasteful – but are they still a necessary evil?’ – Rachel Spence. The article basically talks about how women only exhibitions are almost offensive and kind of single women out rather than putting them onto the same level as men. We need to realise that both men and women are equally capable of making great art and we shouldn’t be looked at for our sex. I don’t want someone to look at my work and say ‘that’s good for a woman’. I want people to look at me as a photographer/filmmaker without having the label ‘female’ in front of it. I understand that these exhibitions are highlighting the success of women and somewhat empowering women that we are good enough to have our own work exhibited and it does bring light to female artists yet I really do think that it defeats the purpose and the aim that women want to achieve. I really want to get the message across that we should not be defined by our sex in any form of work. I hate hearing people say ‘male nurse’, ‘female doctor’, ‘male nanny’, ‘female boss’. I don’t know why we are labelled with our sex in front of our job description just because it seems unusual for a man or a woman to be doing that job.
Another interesting part of the article that I read was that only 7% of works on the walls of MoMA are women. I find this really shocking as women are so poorly represented here. This isn’t actually too shocking as I don’t actually know of many female artists/photographers that do have a strong backing and great work, like Cindy Sherman. I feel that women are underrepresented within the art world and yet become the subject of so many paintings and images. Historically, women have been objectified in paintings and almost made unidentifiable in works such as Picasso’s as he used geometric shapes to create his images which made the women faceless and more as objects rather than human beings. ‘In the US, women make up 60 per cent of art students but just 30 per cent of representation in galleries’ – Rachel Spence. This statement is quite shocking to me as it is so strange to have the statistics that only half the women that are within the creative industry and learning the trade are being successful and actually being exhibited. I feel that there is a prejudice within many careers and societies that women are less capable than men. I find this notion ridiculous as we are only focusing on the small-minded opinions from hundreds of years ago. Women fought for their right to vote, for their right to an education and women have fought and finally we live in a more equal world than it was a hundred years ago. Women have done more than prove themselves capable of being equal to men and keeping up with men. I just cannot comprehend why someone would focus on my sex rather than actually looking at the content that I create and the brains behind it. Women are suppressed all over the world in first, second and third world countries. We are just at different levels. I feel that suppression of women can also be related to a more extreme form of segregation in the rights of black people. In America so many black people are still fighting, loosing their lives and being singled out purely because of the colour of their skin. I don’t understand. Why does any of this matter to people? We shouldn’t be focused on the colour of someone’s skin, their background or their gender, it is so irrelevant. Just because I am female does not mean that I am less capable than a man and just because I am a female does not mean that I cannot think in the same way that a man does and just because I am female does not mean that I am less intelligent than a man. Equality comes when people recognise that there is something wrong and act on it. When people actually stand up for what is right, this is where change happens. Feminism isn’t just about women and feminism doesn’t only have female members, the more men get involved the more we are can recognise as equals and co-exist.

“as long as women aren’t free, men won’t be either.” – Noah Berlatsky

The Guardian article on feminism [written by Antony Loewenstein] http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/oct/28/feminism-lite-is-letting-down-the-women-who-need-it-the-most

Planning, Research

Magazine Research

February 1, 2016 Shannon O'Donnell Leave a comment

I wanted to devote a few double page spreads of my magazine to different issues that I also feel strongly about and think need to be highlighted. I wanted to show a bit more diversity within my magazine and not just solidly focus on the rights and inequalities of women. I am going to add an article about black rights and also the rights of animals as I feel that these issues are also really huge and have, in recent years, been coming into light. This will also make an interesting change in my work and will show another side to my style of work. I really do feel strongly about all three issues that I am going to have in my magazine and believe that each of them are so important and we should really look at them much more than we do. I feel that when people don’t want to get in ‘too deep’ or don’t want to disturb the peace they tend to glaze over these subjects, ignore them and pretend they aren’t there but really all of these issues are right in front of us and we need to start making changes now and we can’t keep on ignoring issues that affect all of our everyday lives.

Embracing black culture

I wanted to make an image about embracing black culture but also being there to fight for the rights for those people who face inequalities. I am constantly seeing black American citizens being ridiculed and attacked just for being black. They face police brutality and always seem to be at the receiving end of their fists. I have never really understood why people discriminate at someone simply because of the colour of their skin. It just seems so stupid and small-minded to me. I would never look as a black person, or anyone for that matter, and think that they are ‘below’ me. I see everyone as my equal and I feel that the rest of the world should see that too. I came across a song by Macklemore and Ryan Lewis entitled White Privilege II and it really made sense. Through this song they express how white people will happily adopt the culture of black people, dress like them, take their music style and yet when it comes to standing up for black rights many white people take a step back and stay silent. This is something that I don’t understand is why wouldn’t they stick up for what is right? I feel that people are in fear that they might get hate or that what they are doing is fine and that there aren’t really any problems. This is wrong, just like feminism people are afraid of it and are unwilling to help because it will make them stand out and some people may try to put them down and tell them that what they are doing is wrong but there is nothing wrong with wanting and fighting for equality. We need to understand that everyone is equal and that we cannot stay silent and just allow these inequalities to persist. The fight for equality doesn’t only lie with women and that is what I want to express through my magazine by adding pages with other unequal parts of our society and highlighting the change that we need to create a better and more equal world.

For this double page spread I am adding into my magazine, I want to have the right page filled with an article that I will make expressing my opinion as well as some facts and statistics about black culture and the way black citizens are treated in the Western world and on the left page I want to create an image of myself wearing a head wrap to show me embracing black culture and to make it really stand out I want to add a caption or slogan down the side, more of a statement that will stand out and make my spectator stop and want to read the next page to find out more about the image and to really understand the message that I am putting across. I have wanted to create an image like this for a while as I feel that it is so important to understand, especially with the constant news reports making worldwide news from America showing white police brutality on black citizens. I chose to wear a head wrap because it holds so much meaning. Before researching I didn’t know much about the head wrap and why African (American) women wore them. I’ve even seen celebrities like Beyonce wear them. After doing some additional research into the meaning behind it I found something very interesting. The head wrap was given to black slaves in America by white American’s who used it as a way of saying that they are owned by them and as a badge of enslavement. This was a way of belittling black people and making them feel less than equal and to show that they were slaves for someone else. It has now evolved into something much more than that, black American’s have taken it back and are embracing their descendants and to show that the head wrap is not a symbol of enslavement but rather a helmet of courage that has evoked an image of true homeland. It has become a uniform of identity and more a uniform of rebellion signifying their resistance to inequalities. I find that the head wrap holds such significance in black history and it really empowers women to embrace their culture and to be proud of who they are. I wanted to add this into my project because it is so strong and I want my entire magazine to be filled with strong and clear images.

Meaning behind the head wrap – http://char.txa.cornell.edu/griebel.htm

Screen Shot 2016-01-28 at 10.52.23 — head wrap mood board

Standing out against animal testing

For a few years now I have really been made aware of animal testing on products. I find it all so barbaric and just cruel. In the past testing on animals has been a part of doctors finding out more about our own anatomy but then they moved on to testing on corpses and opening them up to see what is inside. In the beginning testing makeup products on animals may have been acceptable because mixing chemicals together is risky and really we don’t know how they could effect our bodies, yet part of me wonders why make these products if you can’t be sure that they will be safe on our skin? I really do question current animal testing. We now know what works on our bodies and skin types so why are they continuing to test on animals? The answer lies with marketing, many makeup brands want to be able to sell their products in China and in China in order to be able to sell any products they need to have proof of testing on animals. This is disgusting and unnecessary. There is absolutely no justification in torturing a animal just so you can make more money on your products. I choose not to buy these kinds of products but it can be difficult to tell whether or not products do use animal testing which is why often those that don’t will have that as part of their packaging and marketing, for example all lush products are cruelty free. Starting in the 90s a lot of makeup brands stopped animal testing and decided against it until a few years ago when a large parent company, Estee Lauder, decided that they wanted to branch out to China for more profits so this meant re-introducing animal testing. Under the umbrella parent company of Estee Lauder is companies such as Mac cosmetics, Smashbox, Bobbi Brown, Benefit and many more. There is only one makeup brand that I know of that does not use any animal testing at all and that is Urban Decay. I admit that I do have products from Mac and Benefit but I got these products before I found out about the animal testings that are going on and I won’t be buying any more of their products again, unless animal testing is stopped. Some companies don’t surprise me with the use of animal testing like Chanel and Dior as their clothing obviously uses leather and real fur, they make their money off of stripping animals of their skin and selling it for thousands of pounds. I will say that I have leather items and I do eat meat so some part of me does use animals. However, I will not use or wear products that have been tested on animals. They get tortured, burnt, blinded and starved all for a lipstick that you might wear once or twice a week. I can’t stand the amount of testing on animals and the fact that many people aren’t really being exposed to this annoys me because everyone should know and see what is going on behind the scenes and how these animals are being treated. Animals that are tested on include: rats, mice, hamsters, rabbits and sometimes dogs. A lot of people will say ‘their rodents it doesn’t matter’ but again is there really any justification AT ALL for torture? How can we allow any form of life to be abused in the way that these animals are. I really hate it and think that it should be stopped.
For my shoot idea I want to create a double page spread I want to make images in an ad campaign style with myself as the model posing for the camera but with my hair slicked back with blood and blood covering my hands to show the real effects of the makeup and clothes that a lot of women (and men) wear. I want it to be hard hitting and for my spectator to really think about themselves and what kind of makeup they carry around with them. I wanted to show what it makes me feel like to wear products that have been tested on animals. The reason the blood will be in my hair is because there are also so many hair products that use animal testing and the blood in my hands will add more effect and create a strong image. I also wanted to create an image of a woman walking down the street wearing a fur coat holding bags from companies that do use animal testing. I just think that this will bring in more context and be an interesting image for my spectator to look at.

Animal tested brands (Source): http://www.crueltyfreekitty.com/companies-that-test-on-animals/

Article on animal testing protest: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2134555/Lush-animal-testing-protest-Woman-subjected-experiments-horrified-shoppers.html

Analysis, Record / Photoshoot, Research

Main Influence: Rita Puig-Serra Costa

February 1, 2016 Flora Devenport Leave a comment

Rita Puig-Serra Costa is a spanish photographer who works in the publishing Terranova in Barcelona. After studying Humanities and an MA in Comparative Literature , she studied Graphic Design and Photography at IDEP in the CFD and Observatory .

Most memorably, her book ‘Where Mimosa Bloom’ deals with the grief she suffered following the death of her mother, Where Mimosa Bloom takes the form of an extended farewell letter; with photography skillfully used to present a visual eulogy or panegyric. This grief memoir about the loss of her mother is part meditative photo essay, part family biography and part personal message to her mother. These elements combine to form a fascinating and intriguing discourse on love, loss and sorrow. Rita’s connections with her family reflect a deeply personal insight into the life of herself, her relatives and her beloved mother who it mirrored throughout her photo book.

Screen Shot 2016-01-17 at 21.46.33 — The opening verse to ‘Where Mimosa Bloom’. This idea of a translated script of where Rita originates from indices a personal approach to her project. Her song words set the receiver up to her project. A verse of words at the beginning of my photo book may be a great start to creating a visual narrative, as the reader can follow on from where I left off. The set of images to the side mark the first sequence of media is that of Rita’s family tree, the three generations of her family to mark he change and transitions of death.

Rita’s Style

Rita’s fundamental idea of taking a detailed, vivid portraits and placing it on one side of the page, to then mirror an object reflecting that persons character is idyllic, it reflects a clear idea of personality and connection, making the reader instantly catch on to her family traits and commodities. Using objects of memorabilia and substance tells an abstract narrative for the receiver, they are invited in to celebrate the fortunes of those related to Rita’s mother.

Here is a link to Costa’s online E-Book of ‘Where Mimosa Bloom’: http://www.phasesmag.com/rita-puig-serra-costa/where-mimosa-bloom/#s-12

An article from ‘photo-eye’ indicates that:

“There aren’t any words on the book’s cover, just a detail of a faded snapshot of Puig-Serra Costa as a girl in her family’s light-dappled garden. This could indicate that it’s a book of photographs, but its intimate size is more akin to a literary work.”

Here is the link to the photo-eye article: http://blog.photoeye.com/2015/02/book-review-where-mimosa-bloom.html

Daniel Smith, the reviewer, continues to mention how Costa’s work revolves concisely around the themes of ‘memory’ and ‘transition’, fitting in nicely with the themes of my project. Rita’s work is highly symbolic, the mention of the dried tree at the beginning of the book, a still life of a dried mimosa branch from the same tree does appear later in the book, an indication, like title itself, of the tree’s symbolism. Puig-Serra Costa combined these and other images with memorabilia to create a lyrical visual elegy to her mother, Yolanda Costa Rico (1959-2008).

Rita_PuigSerra_Dani_Pujalte09_670 — Capturing most favoured items or objects is something Rita does to reminisce to times when her Mother was still there. Including items from the past and the present, signifies change but life without someone Rita cared for dearly. Bringing life back up and regurgitating memories allows the reader to connect heavily with her life beforehand, leaving only her mother absent. This, in effect, dictates a sense of transition and movement, certainly change thats happened for Rita and everyone thats featured in her photo-book. With my recreation, I wish to dictate the same sort of messages but with my project of moving house, I want to subvert mainstream expectations, but to capture things seen as ‘outside the box’ – things which wouldn’t usually be associated with moving house.

My Interpretation of Costa:

Uncategorized

online books

February 1, 2016 2873 Claudia Viveiros Leave a comment

In order to create my final book, we have been instructed to research it online and look at layouts and designs.

The website we used was: http://www.blurb.co.uk/

Here is a mood board of some photo books i liked:

I like how the photograph is places by itself on the right hand side of the page. The white border surrounding it gives it neatness and a bold outline that catches my attention.

Similarly, I like how this photograph is displayed across 3/4 of the rectangular book.

Considerations:

what type of cover will i use?
will the cover have various images or just one?
how much space will i leave in between images?
what borders will i use? color selection?

Include:

quotes from the photographers and the people that i interview
podcasts – either music or them speaking
always have some sort of text (describing), even if the picture takes up the whole page
maybe some illustrations to go with it, or special associations with the subject – eg drawing, plaque with name, newspaper article – this makes it very personal and interesting

Uncategorized

personal study draft version

February 1, 2016 2873 Claudia Viveiros Leave a comment

Personal Study for Photography

Question: How do two different islands, with environmental and cultural differences, change people’s outlooks on life?

Introduction

In this personal study I want to explore the various differences between Madeira and Jersey; which are European islands situated in the Atlantic. Since I was born in Jersey and have many Madeiran family members, I’ve always been intrigued by these two worlds. During the course I became quite interested in documentation and I liked the idea of capturing real moments. I’ll be comparing two photographers throughout my study; this includes Sebastiao Salgado and David Alan Harvey. Although both artists work in a diverse style, the many similarities in their work unite them. Salgado’s photographs focus mostly on rural places which opposes Harvey’s creations. Salgado stated: “The only way to give us an incentive, to bring hope, is to show the pictures of the pristine planet.” This quote highly applies to the peaceful and majestic images that I took in Madeira as 77% of the region is uninhabited. The photojournalist shows mostly traditional scenes with portraits of people in their natural surroundings. David Alan Harvey’s street photography also captures exquisite moments in modern and developed counties. He said: “Don’t shoot what it looks like. Shoot what it feels like.” He portrays the fact that the feeling in the image is better than the aesthetical qualities. I have emulating his work and taken pictures of Jersey, since it’s a very lively and developed place. This will make for a very interesting comparison as both of them have separate ideologies, opinions on people and the earth. During editing I want to experiment with black and white filters much like Salgado and also some colour like Harvey uses. I’d like to discover if: the environment, culture, community, tradition, family, lifestyle, etc; has an impact on us and how that effect changes depending on the style it’s photographed in.

Paragraph 1 – Jersey and Madeira

Jersey and Madeira have many similarities, but in accordance they also have a lot of differences. For instance, they are both situated in the North Atlantic Ocean in the continent of Europe. Jersey’s a British island situated off the coast of France; it’s famous for its Jersey cows, natural produce and lovely picturesque beaches. Much like Madeira, it’s the biggest island in its channel.

The environment in Jersey is maintained and kept clean in the majority of areas; where trees are in abundance and wildlife can thrive. In fact it’s is the only location in Britain, where green wall lizards naturally occur. Similarly, they resemble the Madeiran wall lizard which is also native to the island. Nonetheless, once in the capital of St. Helier, you can notice the change; the town and surroundings are filled with an array of: business buildings, houses and hotels, which give it a much more civilised ambience; especially in the high-street, since there is a lack of green spaces in that area. In accordance to culture, the island holds many events, for instance: Battle of Flowers, Jersey Live, the Eisteddfod, Bonfire night, Battle of Britain, market days and even food festivals; which incorporate Portuguese food and make a connection to Madeira. Tourists may be attracted to vintage landmarks such as: castles, underground hospital and bunkers. These historical places enclose many intriguing stories and demonstrate the struggles of the time, for instance when the German’s invaded.

In accordance, the Madeiran environment is made up of beautifully natural areas. The picturesque surroundings are filled with wild plants, animals and buildings. Most parishes contain an array of the common orange-tiled houses; but since 77% of the island is uninhabited, it’s not surprising that the overall island is eco-friendly. Madeira is commonly associated to the slogan: “Pearl of the Atlantic.” The pearl referred to is actually black; which makes sense as it reflects Madeira’s black sandy beaches and volcanic terrains. The word is also connected to beauty and value, which the island upholds. The capital city of Funchal is always beaming with different activities like: cable cars, hot air balloon rides, toboggan sled rides, etc. Cultural activities include:

Content: you could look at the following…exemplify your hypothesis and introduce your first photographer. Select key works, ideas or concepts and analyse in-depth using specific model of analysis (describe, interpret and evaluate) – refer to your hypothesis. Contextualise…what was going on in the world at the time; artistically, politically, socially, culturally. Other influences…artists, teachers, mentors etc. Personal situations or circumstances…describe key events in the artist’s life that may have influenced the work. Include examples of your own photographs, experiments or early responses and analyse, relate and link to the above. Set the scene for next paragraph.

Paragraph 2 – Influences and Styles – (287 words) and (? words)

Salgado was born in Brazil and grew up in a humble manner surrounded by uninhabited landscapes that covered approximately 70% of his small town; he had a real sense of community. His interest in economics, lead him to study it at university; the course taught him about: production, consumption, transfer and wealth. After dropping all for a pursuit in the photography world, he started to passionately photograph human and animal conditions, and I believe that these topics were influenced by his previous economical knowledge, as well as the fact that he witnessed his hometown changing into industrial mayhem. He stated: “my photography is consistent ideologically and ethically with person I am”; this could indicate that his: life experiences, goals, family life and opinions are used as inspiration for his studies. He also mentioned that: “I don’t believe a person has a style. What people have is a way of photographing what is inside them. What is there comes out”; this further justifies that his photographs are based on his ideological viewpoints of the world. Nevertheless, Salgado was inspired by many photographers’ works such as: Lewis Hine, W. Eugene Smith and Walker Evans’s. Their sullen and bold style included dramatic contrasts of black and white, which Salgado liked. I think that Salgado used black and white to create a timeless image that could be portrayed by viewers in either one way or another, like the phrase ‘black and white way of seeing’. Black is symbolic of: purity, equality, fairness, independence, hope, etc. Meanwhile black signifies: hidden, unknown, fear, negativity, depression, etc. Whereas grey indicates: neutral and indecisive. Growing up in a modern time allowed Salgado to submerge himself into new insights which he discovered through travelling the world.

Experimentation

Fashion Magazine | Experimentation

January 30, 2016 Shannon O'Donnell Leave a comment

Here is all of the experimentation that I have done towards making my fashion magazine. I have changed my mind on what I want to create for the fashion magazine but I still wanted to add in this experimentation as creating all of the different personas has really helped me to create a better final outcome and to really get into character.

These images are parodying those young women that get lip fillers and work done on their bodies. I find this so trivial and something that young women shouldn’t even have to worry about. But that is the society we live in. We ridicule women publicly in magazines, on TV shows and to one another that it becomes hard for any woman to ever feel good about herself. The ideal of being the perfect woman is constantly drilled into young women’s minds making them feel that if they do not look a certain way then they aren’t good enough or that no one could ever love them. This ideal is so stupid and I wanted to make that clear in these images showing clearly how silly it makes young women look and that they should just embrace themselves and stop dwelling on the physical unimportant things. I do have to mention that I am nowhere near body confidence and I do see myself in a negative light, like most women. This is because we are constantly bombarded with celebrities and their flaws so if a celeb is flawed what does that make me? We forget that we are all human and that there are times where we aren’t going to look our best but there is nothing wrong with that, it’s what makes us human.

Above is an experimentation that I originally wanted to use as the front cover of my fashion magazine. The words written across my face are words that I’ve either been called or seen other women being called online and in person. I wanted to impact my spectator straight away and show them few derogatory words that are thrown at women daily. I came up with the idea and took inspiration from a past shoot that I did on femme fatales and found as many derogatory terms aimed at women as I possibly could. This research and previous experimentation has really helped me with this experiment. I also took inspiration from a video that I watched of a feminist activist group called the Pussy Riots. I came across such words in the comments that people had written anonymously. These comments were so offensive and vulgar. It really made me think about what those words meant and how someone can just through such words around as if they don’t hold much meaning or aren’t that offensive. Some of the language used to define women is absolutely disgusting and really belittles women is such a way that cannot really be defended. So in this shoot I am taking back those words, I wear them on my skin to show that the words that those people use to define me do not change who I am and they are just words. The term ‘feminazi’ came from a comment I saw and it really stood out to me. The fact that feminists, people that want equality, are compared to that of the Nazi’s that killed millions upon millions of innocent men, women and children is absolutely wrong and unjust. I find the word extremely offensive and something that shouldn’t have even been thought of. It really does show to me that the people who make these comments don’t know what they are talking about and they aren’t worth it. Those people who use words as if they are part of the english dictionary really make me wonder. How can people be so blinded by pure hatred and how can they be so stuck in their ways that they don’t even want to think about the idea of equality and won’t even try to understand what the word feminism actually means.

Some of my experimentation’s are incomplete but this is purely because I changed my mind on the whole magazine idea. I think that what I was working towards was good work and I feel that I have been able to portray both the male and female characters well. I chose to become both male and female in my shoots as I took inspiration from Claude Cahun and her work challenging the norms of how men and women should be. I wanted my work to stand out and to make sense to a wide variety of spectator. This experiment was fun to do and has helped me with the process of choosing appropriate props and settings for my final outcomes. The above image is the start of a magazine layout idea that I had and acts as a double page spread. I wanted to show the differences in male and female style as well as the idea of being masculine and feminine. I wanted to mimic existing model’s style and the way magazine photographers want their models to look and how to be positioned. I do like these images as I do think that I look like a male in the images and think that I was able to successfully portray a stereotypical masculine physique by the positions that I am standing/sitting in.

For this shoot I made a t-shirt that I got inspiration for while watching a feminist campaign online. I saw a sign that stated ‘Feminism. Back By Popular Demand’ and thought it was great and wanted to take that and bring it into my own work. I decided to paint it free-hand on the back of a plain white t-shirt that I had and on the front I decided to free-hand the symbol of female. I thought that this would work well and be a clear indication to my spectator that it was a step towards supporting feminism. For my characters I created a male and female. The male is wearing the front of the shirt with the female showing off the back of it. I thought it would also be a good idea for them to be holding paint brushes to show that they created the shirts together and are unified together. I really wanted this to be a clear message and easy for my spectator to understand. I think that this worked out well and the images came out successfully. The reason I decided against this idea of creating a magazine was because there would be so much editing to do and the lighting wasn’t right in the images as well as the fact that I came up with a new better idea. These ideas went well at the time but I did not want to develop them further.

2016 Photo A2 Blog