This is another photograph that was taken of and created by Chino Otsuka. This photo montage is again the manipulation of merging two different photographs into one. The original photograph was taken in 1981 and the second photograph being taken in 2006, therefore meaning that there are 25 years between the two photographs.  These photographs are only a few from Chino Otsuka’s series called ‘Imagine Finding Me’.  The title alone can be viewed and considered in a few different ways. The first way that I have considered this title is that maybe she has always wanted to see herself from an outsider’s perspective and see what see looks like or is like. Another way in which I have considered this title is that maybe the title is a metaphor for her wanting to find herself. Maybe she still, after all those years and after growing up she still doesn’t really know who she is, or who she wants to be. Therefore, maybe she is/was in hope that by finding herself she would know exactly who she or what she wants to become. This could be telling us the truth about Chino Otsuka as a person, however, she found a way to visually present those feelings, thoughts and conflicts between herself. Now going back to the photograph itself, just like all her other photographs, we can see that they are a classic example of what vernacular photography is. However, this particular photo montage is not the same as her other ones that she has included in this series. The original photograph is of her as a little girl posing and looking at the camera in front of what it looks to be a Japanese monument. However, the second photograph that she has included of herself, just makes it look like any ordinary woman walking up the stairs as the original photograph was being taken. The thoughts that come to mind that could be a reason as to why Otsuka has decided to create this particular photo montage is that maybe she has come to a stage in her self discovery, where she can seem to get anywhere, and she just cannot seem to figure out who she is or who is wants to become that she has decided to ignore herself. I feel like this photo montage was created with the intention of representing the fact that she feels like a stranger within herself, that if she, at this stage in her life and self discovery found herself in the street or metaphorically she would have not recognized herself therefore ignoring her. These are just some of my thoughts when looking and analyzing  Otsuka’s work in some depth and detail.

This is a photograph that was taken of and created by Chino Otsuka. Although, the original photograph was a normal and simple vernacular photograph, it has been altered, therefore I am going to be referring to it as a photo montage. So, this photo montage that we can see above is showing us Otsuka attwo different stages in her life.  We are easily able to tell which photograph is the original photograph, this is because she cannot go back in time therefore the original photograph is of when she was a little girl. The first image was taken in 1976 and the second photograph was taken in 2005, therefore having  a big difference of 29 years. Something fascinating about Chino Otsuka is that she is able to manipulate her images so well that it really looks like they are two separate people having a photograph being taken of them at the same time. I personally think that, for Otsuka to be able to create illusory photo montages such as this one, she is having to analyse the original photograph and going back to where the original photograph was actually taken from. Then, with these two similar but different photographs, she is able to digitally alter them to make them look very real.  Here we can see that, she is at the beach, where she is looking straight at the camera both of the times, making it look like someone staged her, however not looking like the same person to look straight at the camera. This is a classic example of vernacular photography, where a holiday or a fun day is specially recorded so the family can have a memory of that day, place forever.