David Bailey

David Bailey is a portrait photographer that has shaped and formed the way artists in his footsteps photograph – he is one of the most famous contemporary portrait photographer known for his ability to capture a subject so truly in black and white.

The Visual Artists on David Bailey: “considered one of the pioneers of contemporary photography, David Bailey is credited with photographing some of the most compelling images of the last five decades. He first rose to fame making stars of a new generation of models including Jean Shrimpton and Penelope Tree. Since then his work has never failed to impress and inspire critics and admirers alike, capturing iconic images of legends such as: The Rolling Stones, the Kray twins, Damien Hirst and Kate Moss, these simple yet powerful black and white images have become a genre in their own right.”

Looking at the work of Bailey is will be vital in ensuring I can create real and true portrait images because form looking a his work, I will be able to study the way he captures a subject using different facial expression and body positioning. Bailey often uses different shot types such as close ups or medium shots that include the models abdominal. Bailey is known for using plain white backgrounds as backdrops for his shots and then dresses each model he shoots in dark clothes that will deliberately contrast this white background to allow the black and white film to work to its full effect and provide that heavy contrast he is known for capturing between the subject and the background – making the subject so defined and at the forefront of the frame – as they should be. I aim to take inspiration from the way Bailey captures close ups so well in his photoshoots and will attempt to do this in my own because I believe that close ups are the most expressive because this is when the audience feel the closest to the subject and can see the intricate details on their face. As well, Bailey will tell his subjects to mostly keep a straight face for most of the time and to look directly in to the cameras lens in order to capture their personality in the best way.

Furthermore, it is the little touches that Bailey implements into his work that makes it so expressive and unique – in the mages below, you can notice how each subject has their mouth open ever so slightly and this is likely intended and has been instructed and directed by Bailey.

However, Bailey uses a studio on all shoots and takes advantage of his access to a professional studio to interact with his subjects on personal level to direct them fully. Because Bailey photographed most predominantly and at his peak in the 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s, street fashion photography was unknown and unheard of because photographers were so comfortable with photographing in a studio environment where factors such as lighting, interaction with the model and background were much more controllable by the photographer. Street photography relied on natural circumstances including natural light and the backdrop of photos would have to be carefully chosen by the photographer as well as the day of shooting to take into account weather.

However, Bailey soon took up street fashion photography and again, became a pioneer of this. After photographing the most famous people in the world in his studio in London for many years, he tuned to street photography and used his most preferred model and girlfriend at the time, Jean Shrimpton.

The image below show Bailey’s attempts at street fashion photography using his girlfriend Jean Shrimpton. Shrimpton was an English model and actress. She was an icon of Swinging London and is considered to be one of the world’s first supermodels.

To fiullfil Baileys fiull poetntila as astreet photographer, him and his girlfeind, Shrimnpton made their first foreign trip for Vogue.

NY JS DB 62 is a groundbreaking series of work that was made into a book first published in 2007 from the images produced by Bailey and Shrimpton’s New York trip. The images made were made with Bailey’s recently acquired 35mm camera. Newly freed from the confines of the studio, he shot rapidly on the streets.

The book is entitled NY JS DB 62 – the NY stands for New York, the JS, Jean Shrimpton, the DB, David Bailey and the 62 for 1962 – the date which the series of street photographs was shot.

The images in the book were completely different to what both Bailey was ever used as he explored the streets of America with his camera in an environment that he was very unfamiliar with and it was also a shock for the people who were followed the work of Bailey for so long as they would be used to carbon copy versions of the same image Bailey was capturing fr many years – studio shots of actors, musicians, artists faces. Now, Bailey was using the street as his studio and capturing much more candid, informal and unstaged shots of his girlfriend exploring the New York. The above images shows this perfectly as Shrimpton strands, poised to begin playing an arcade game.

 

William Klein

William Klein was another very famous photographer who also used the street as his alternative studio set up to capture much more urban-inspired fashion shots of the most sought-after models as well as strangers in the street. Klein, like Bailey used black and white film on his large forma camera to capture with what looks like a 24mm lens, close ups of crowds of people in the streets of America. Klein is an American-born French photographer and filmmaker noted for his ironic approach to media and his extensive use of unusual photographic techniques in the context of photojournalism and fashion photography.

 

 

What is evident in Klein’s work is his ability to capture people in the streets without their knowing  the presence of the camera. Although they will be aware of Klein’s presence and the camera presence, they will not perform anything for the camera and instead just go about their life whilst Klein uses his camera as a tool of recording. Klein, as shown int here images below picks out particular characters in the streets that he spots and uses either methods of physically getting close to the subject or using a large zoom, which would only have been possible later in his career after the introduction of digital cameras and he captures the features that he has recognised as interesting in a character. The characters that Klein photographs have been chosen carefully by the photographer as he would usually spend a day in a couple of key spots on the streets and watch the world go past. He would attempt to pick out characters that could show the area he is photographing well.

 Widely acknowledged as a significant innovator in the history and design of the photo book, Klein published his first book Life is Good and Good For You in New York in 1956, which won the Prix Nadar the following year. Capturing the rough and tumble of daily life, Klein’s brutally honest images caused a major sensation.

Soon after Klein made a name for himself in the recently introduced street fashion scene that saw photographer take to the streets and use the natural happenings on the street as their content, he had achieved widespread fame as a fashion photographer for Vogue and for his photo essays on various cities. And despite having no formal training as a photographer, Klein was a natural and won several awards.

 

 However, Klein stated to a journalist for The Guardian in 2014 that “my feeling for the city hasn’t changed” and “the photographs I took were a corroboration of everything I resented in America and in New York.” Here he saying that his images were a confirmed physical evidence and validation of his resent for the city and country and he aimed, in his photographs to show everything he disliked about the city. His photographs are very gritty and this is what I have taken inspiration from for my own images.

Although I am not capturing my subjects in the same manner as Klein does in a very candid and typical street photograph manner that consists of quick snapshots of people running through streets. I want to capture a gritty and very personal presentation of my subject and will use Klein’s technique of getting close to his subjects at times to capture the details of faces.

Klein was another photographer that was naturally a studio photographer, like Bailey but then turned to the streets in order to capture a different mood and tone in his images. In Klein’s case, from shooing in the street he was able to capture a much more gritty sand raw depiction of America which was emphasised by the black and white format he shot in.

 

Wolfgang Tillmans

Wolfgang Tillmans is a German photographer. His diverse body of work is distinguished by observation of his surroundings.

Tillmans was the first photographer – and also the first non-British person – to be awarded the Tate annual Turner Prize.

Tillmans was initially known for his seemingly casual, sometimes snapshot-like portraits of friends and other youth in his immediate surroundings and scene. His photos – from the Europride in London (1992) or the Love Parade in Berlin (1992), for example – appeared in magazines such as i-D, Spex, Interview, SZ Magazin and Butt, and established his reputation as a prominent witness of a contemporary social movement.

Most of Tillmans work is staged, with the artist choosing the clothes and the location, as well as setting his models up in their positions. Furthermore, in Tillamns work, he tries ot capture freedom through the way the model presents him/herself to the camera. In his early photographs of people, Tillman’s portrayed freedom in a different way and he says: “I wanted to somehow represent what was not being represented elsewhere.” Tillmans uses the themes of gender identity and sexual orientation to define the way he photographs and how he presents them. His portraits, still lifes, sky photographs (e.g. the Concorde series) and landscapes are motivated equally by aesthetic and political interests and like I said, especially related to homosexuality and gender identity.

In 2012, he abandoned film photography altogether and became a full-time digital photographer which is what separates Tillmans and Bailey/Klein because Tillmans is photographing in an era that is much more technologically advanced and this allows for him to control his shoot more and capture a more crisp and true image. As well, Tillmans has a passion and love for the streets and the club and these inspire him in his work along with his work in the gay movement rights.

Tillmans’ himself has in fact experienced AIDS and has suffered from its consequences. This battle with AIDS has informed his work and he uses his knowledge and experience of it to create meaningful works. His experience with AIDS began at the age of 26. Ever since, Tillmans has been fighting AIDS and he states in his interview with SHOWStudio’s, that after experiencing this feels he like life is fragile, and should not take advantage of it.

Tillmans touches upon very tender subjects in his work and this is what has made him so successful because his work is very true and the actual quality of his photographs, taking away the message behind them are of a very high quality. Tillmans uses quite warm colours and dark colours such as burgundys, browns and maroons to provide body to what he is photographing.

In an interview with The Guardian, Tillman’s speaks of his recent projects.