After half term I started building potentials ideas for the exam under the umbrella of Freedom and Limitations. I have decided to explore the freedom and limitations in change in nature in how old replaces the new. I have mind mapped some concepts which I feel interested in considering as part of my project for the freedoms found in evolution in nature and as a result of this, the passing of the new into the old.
Laura El-Tantawy is an Egyptian photographer who was born in Woecestershire, England to Egyptian parents. She attended a high school in Saudi Arabia and started university in Cairo, Egypt. She completed her degree in the US. Since Laura has been living between the East and the West for most of her life, she has experienced both immense enlightenment and anxiety. She had to contemplate notions of home, identity, culture and her self. Laura uses photography as an artistic medium of limitless boundaries to explore these themes. She has an extremely impressionistic eye on reality, and Laura explores social and environmental issues linking to her background. Because of Laura’s multicultural lifestyle as well as using photography as an artistic expression she also uses it as an inner voice to reflect upon her own identity and how it relates to the world around her. She mostly works on self-initiated projects.
In an article by National Geographic, Laura says, “My photographic interest in a project typically stems from having some personal connection with the subject matter,” she said. “Having lived between East and West much of my life, I have often felt lost between the traditional ideologies instilled in my upbringing and the extremely liberal practices of the West. I had to find a defining balance for myself as an individual, and my work as a documentary photographer has helped me do that. Dealing with who I am as a person and my position on the critical social issues facing the world today—particularly those pertaining to my background—is at the heart of all the themes I take on in my work.”
Laura El-Tantawy did a project called Beyond here is nothing at all. This is how Laura describes the series. Beyond Here Is Nothing is a photographic meditation on the notion of home. To be home is to feel a strong connection to a land and a grounding to its roots. For much of my life home has been an abstract place far away from my reach. This body of work navigates the boundaries of being – exploring the
unsettling feeling of rootlessness, the mental burden of loneliness and the constant search for belonging in unfamiliar places. Here are some of the images from the series with a description of what the images mean and contain.
I love the whole of this series by Laura. Each of her images are so unique and creative. You can see her creative eye and the way she views things. The series has such a contrast of ideas ranging from silhouettes, reflections, blurred lights, and images of clouds. This series is very surreal and has a dream like effect to it. She uses a lot of colour and shapes to create her story like images. She has framed a particular object that she wants to fragment to reveal what she sees. The series is about Laura’s idea of home and of her surroundings. Since Laura didn’t have the benefit of feeling rooted to one particular place she tries to capture this feeling rootlessness within her images. The images do have this sense of loneliness and confusion and that is what Laura is trying to get across. I choose Laura El-Tantawy as my artist research because I love how shes uses double exposure and other forms of manipulation to create the things she wants to reveal in her process.
Another series that Laura does is called A Series of Surprises and Human Interventions.Laura admits that this series happened by accident. The series was captured in December 2015. She had traveled to the city of her birth for the first time. With the use of a Polaroid and some film she walked around the city streets of Ronkswood. She said she choose a Polaroid as her tool because she wanted to bring to life the history of her birth place without changing the way it looked in her head. Since she used a Polaroid, to Laura’ s frustration she had discovered that the images had not turned out. She says ‘ thinking an image was captured only to discover it wasn’t.’ This is how she describes the series of her home city. “The images are an imaginary landscape where the touch of man adds life in the form of chemicals – a wave of colors reminiscent of water, vibrant plantations and snowy mountains.” Here are some of the images that she created. 
These images are another form of manipulation by Laura. Instead of digitally manipulating the image, she does it by hand using water and chemicals. I like both of these series by Laura and I want to use both ideas in some way for my next step. I plan to do a similar process using the concept of double exposure. I also plan to experiment with photo paper and chemicals to create some man made landscapes like Laura’s.
An article by Lewis Bush called ‘ Eight ‘rules’ of photography that are worth breaking ‘ explains how breaking the rules of photography can be extremely beneficial. He writes that breaking the rules can be a way of seeing the world in a new light, “break all the rules and pioneer a new way of seeing the world.” He also says that the real stories of our time aren’t always plain to see. He is trying to explain that sometimes the most interesting concept is not clearly visible. We as the photographer have to break the rules and push the boundaries to isolate the what we really want to see. In the article, Bush talks about a photographer called William Eugene Smith. Smith is an American Photojournalist who is extremely dedicated to his projects. In 1955 Smith traveled to Pittsburgh on what was meant to be a three week assignment, however turned into a year long ‘photographic binge.’ He came away with over 17,000 images.
He later moved to Japan to document the consequences of devastating industrial pollution. Within this process, he faced extreme violence from the people he was exposing. He was also becoming to involved with the people he was photographing. According to one writer, Smith was the man who tried to document everything. During his photographic career, Smith broke nearly every rule there was in photography. Some of these included, posing his subjects, manipulating his prints and becoming dangerously involved in his stories. When people quentioned him to why he broke the rules he said, “I didn’t write them- why should I follow them?” Smith proved that successful photographers can break the rules. Bush writes that many rules restrict the medium, “serve vested interests and prevent photographers from revealing the critical issues that are shaping our modern world.” Here are some images by Smith. 
These are the eight rules that Bush talks about. The rule of Objectivity, the rule of Audience, The rule of Manipulation, The rule of Reality, The rule of Technicality, The rule of ownership, The rule of the camera and the Rule of rule breaking. The rule that I will be focusing on is the rule of manipulation.
This rule is about photographers being forbidden to use any form of digital editing to manipulate the meaning of their images. Some photographers like Steve McCurry are more interested in the professional accolades than the integrity of the stories they use. However, Bush believes that every stage of the photographic process is a manipulation. A documentary filmmaker called Errol Morries explains you don’t need to manipulate an image to mislead an audience, you just need to simply change the caption. He also says that when used in the right context, manipulation can reveal the truth. A Dutch photographer called Alice Wielinga traveled to North Korea, she found it hard to capture the truth. She says, “I felt that, with mere documenting, I wasn’t able to tell the story as I was experiencing it,” Since she was not happy with her images, she decided to digitally merge her images of official North Korea propaganda with her own images of workers and decaying factories. “I see propaganda and reality as two sides of the same coin,” she says. “Propaganda is an essential part of everyday life in North Korea, and because of that a reality in itself.” Here are some of her final edits.
For my exam project I want to experiment with shadow, and life as a whole. I want to research more about the spiritual concepts within photography and how everyday situations can by a thing of beauty. Rather then capturing whole scenes and objects I plan to fragment certain things to capture an abstract view. These mood boards below are different ideas of the style and type of images I want to obtain throughout the project. I also want to challenge myself by doing something I’ve never done before, which is creating a cinematic film based on light and the shapes and shadows it creates.
My main aim is to represent the world in a way of how I personally view it. We all have a freedom of expression and the freedom to see things how we want. I’m using my project to expressive my personal outlook of the world. I also want to look at the spiritual context of images and how insignificant things that happen day to day should be represented in a more extraordinary way.
On my return to school after half-term, we swiftly moved onto looking at the exam criteria and how we can build and generate ideas relating to the exam theme of Freedom and/or Limitations. The first task I completed in order to aid my development of ideas for I may wish to carry out for the exam, I gathered with a couple of other members of my class to create a brainstorm which outlined different keywords surrounding the concept of freedom/limitations. During the lesson we collectively came up with several; ideas in which we could possibly explore over the next few months. Considering freedom and limitation is such a broad criteria, it was relatively simple to come up with many ideas but also quite a challenge because it was difficult to transfer out ideas into how we would produce a series of photographic work surrounding it.
After out group task and then discussing our ideas a class afterwards, I decided to create an online mind map of what we had started thinking of. Below is the image if the online version of my mind map. I created this on a program called WordItOut which allowed me to insert specific works into the software and afterwards, it would generate a colourful and creative bundle of words of different sizes and colours to replicate the look of a mind map. This was a quick task I thought would benefit me as it allowed me to re-write what I had already written in the group task and it is presented in a creative way. This task was intended to allow me to pick a handful of keywords from the long list already created and create a more detailed mind map outlining the key words in more detail where I talk about what I could explore in each idea.
Freedom and limitation is very broad and so I have decided to quickly group together several keywords from each binary opposition. In my more detailed mind map I will divide the page into freedom and limitations and talk about a few possibilities for each. I am still unsure on what I actually want to explore for my project because it is so early on in the process but these tasks are intended to allow me opportunities to weigh up my most preferred options and discard the ideas I dislike to allow me the chance to understand more so what it is I want to carry out for my exam project.
As well a using my own knowledge of what freedom and limitations mean to me already, I will also utilise the exam booklet which I have been handed and this covers different starting points students cab use when they are exploring the subject of Photography. This mentions different artists and their works at which we can look at for inspiration as well as introduction to what freedom and limitation can entail and the history of art and visual communication in relation to freedom and limitation.
Below is a Word Docuemnt version of a more detailed look at different possibilities for what I could explore in my project. However these are pony starting ideas and it was an opportunity for me to quickly get my thoughts down about each category. When I progress further into the exam work, I will be required to think more carefully about what exactly it is I want to work on. The concept of looking at fashion as a means of freedom is something I am most attracted to and this was the first potential idea I thought of when the exam criteria was revealed because of my own passion for fashion and expressing myself through clothes, following trends and being unique in my own physical look. I already have an envision of what the final product could look like but still need to plan and research until the point at which I have several thoughts for different paths I can take.
Initially we got into groups and discussed the different subtopics or categories we could think of that linked to our exam title ‘Freedom and/or Limitations’. whilst creating a mind map of our initial ideas we discussed what kind of photographs we could make through these ideas. Different areas we came up with that i could focus on during the exam period could be: the limitations of varying cultures and religions, the knew freedom of technology, creativity and the growth of what is considered to be artwork, the freedom and limitations of expression over time, travel and how it can limit you but also make you free, the different that money can make how an individuals freedom or how a lack of money can becoming limiting. One of the main ideas which came to mind when considering freedom and limitations was politics and the political restrictions which are evident in our society and past 100 years and how laws, debates, protest, political freedom can be conveyed through photography.
Looking deeper into the theme of freedom and limitations i have research artists which show how artistic freedom has changed over decades and also look at the freedom and limitations shown through different materials and mediums.
Archibald MacLeish, an American poet wrote that ‘Freedom is the right to choose.’ This is considered to follow the political context and states that if you have the right to choice then you are experiencing freedom. This was then translated to artist where they began to be inspired and wanted to show freedom of choice through what they painted and what would be considered artwork. Fauvism was the first twentieth century movement in modern art. For Fauves such as André Derain and Henri Matisse freedom was the right to paint in whatever colours they chose. The paintings of the Fauves were characterized by seemingly wild brush work and strident colors, while their subject matter had a high degree of simplification and abstraction.
Fauvism can be seen as an extreme development of Van Gogh’s Post-Impressionism. Van Gogh work included landscapes, still lifes, portraits which were characterised by bold colours and dramatic, impulsive and expressive brushwork that contributed to the foundations of modern art. He was seen as a romantic artist, who chose to take artwork into his own form. The expressive brushstrokes that he used combined with a compleatly unique and unseen of vision of the world became one of the biggest inspirations of the twentieth century for artists to engage in the freedom of choice to paint/create artwork which was like no other.
Piet Mondrian, was a dutch painter and Theoretician who has become regarded as one of the greatest artists of the 20th century. As one of the pioneers of abstract art similar to van gogh, he changed the artistic direction and expanded on the limitations of art forms. He increased the abstract style on the tweentieth century and focused on geometric shapes and elements to his artwork. His expression of artwork further exercised the amount of artistical freedom one could have. His use of the three primary colours, primary values and primary directions of horizontal and vertical created a ‘universal beauty’. He was known to encounter experiments in cubism where cubists explored the choice to depict form and space.
Edgar Degas (19 July 1834 – 27 September 1917) was a French artist famous for his paintings, sculptures, prints, and drawings. He is especially identified with the subject of dance; more than half of his works depict dancers. He is regarded as one of the founders of Impressionism, although he rejected the term, preferring to be called a realist.
More detailed mindmap exploring ideas:
In preparation for our final exam, we were made aware of the exam question or starting point. This year ours was ‘Freedom and Limitations.’ Firstly we made a mind-map of our ideas in groups of two, these ideas were developed in a class discussion and we picked out ideas, which we felt that personally we could develop and explore. We identified we could use the two contrasting words as binary, investigating the meaning of both words and how these differ. However, we also realise we could focus on one of the two words, which is what I would like to do. Either focus on the theme of freedom or limitations. As of now, I am gravitating towards the word ‘Limitations.’ These are my ideas for both words.
Freedom- The power or right to act, speak or think as one wants.
Limitations- a limiting rule or circumstance; a restriction.
Some of them appeal to me than others as I know what I like and are more successful at photographing. I recognise I like to work with a story more than a theme or concept, therefore some of my ideas are developing a story around a person or society. I would like to discuss some of my ideas to expand them and make them more clear.
Explanation of key ideas:
Mental Health or Disability:
Mental health is becoming increasing more common, which could be due to more people experiencing the symptoms and being diagnosed or that we now can detect mental health issues much more accurately with our new and consistently improving knowledge. However, with a mental health disorder you get the label, which comes with it. This is a stigma of mental health, which are societies attitudes towards individuals with mental disorders. This is because this group of people are labelled abnormal and are treated differently in society. This leaves the individual feeling shut out from the world as they are not associated as ‘normal.’ This could lead to serious implications when it comes to the individual leading a ‘normal’ life.
This is similar to disability, however this is something we can normally see. Again, people with a disability are perceived in a different way in society. They are expected to not achieve as much as ‘normal’ people and can therefore underachieve as a result of a lack of effect to press these people to the best of there abilities. People with disabilities often don’t get asked if they have dreams or goals because society assumes they will not achieve this as do not have a normal functioning body or mind. This limits them in life to do things they want to do.
Both of these ideas show that their free will, which is the power of acting without the constraint. Instead, they are limited by their disorder or disability but also limited by society and ignorance. This supports the debate of determinism which proposes that all behavior and actions are caused by preceding factors and is thus predictable. What I mean by this is, once the individual is diagnosed with having a disability or mental illness, their life is perceived differently.
Prisoners/prison cells:
When an individual is imprisoned for their immoral actions, they are then limited to the confined space of a cell. This limits their freedom of life choices and opportunities. Once a person has again been labelled as a criminal and therefore this will stay with them throughout their lives. This might limit them, especially when it comes to their careers and finding a job, as they will still be viewed as a criminal 10 years, 20 years down the line. The labeling does not go away. Within the prison itself, the prisoners are limited to the daily routine and are not allowed to make choices about what they want to do and when.
These 3 ideas are my main suggestions for my exam project. Further research and discussion will filter them to give me my final idea, which I will then advance with more research, analysis and experimentation. These ideas are revolved around labeling and limitations, however, I am not sure which one of these projects I will chose to progress.
WHY : challenge the idea that photography has its own language, independent of words.Following the decimation and rebuilding of Japanese society after the Second World War, photography played an important part in a new self-definition of Japanese visual style, set apart from Western influences.
Provoke was a magazine with only three issues in the late 1960s, but its influence continued into the 1970s and 80s. It set itself apart from the photojournalistic style of the day, looking for a more subjective voice and validation of the person behind the camera. The images are often grainy and disorderly, reflecting the social and political upheavals taking place across the nation. It also constrasted with the glossy imagery of commercial magazines.
Takuma Nakahira and Yutaka Takanashi were founding members of the Provoke group. Daido Moriyama joined a little later, bringing with him his early influences of Cartier-Bresson, but with a desire to be a witness with more self-expressive intent.
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The main subject of this project is Provoke (Purovōku), an experimental magazine founded by photographers Yutaka Takanashi and Takuma Nakahira, critic Koji Taki, and writer Takahiko Okada in 1968. The magazine’s subtitle read as: shisō no tame no chōhatsuteki shiryō (Provocative documents for the sake of thought). Photographer Daido Moriyama, the photographer most often associated with the publication, did not join the magazine until the second issue. Provoke lasted only three issues with a small print run, but was tremendously influential. |
Provoke argued that the photographer can capture what cannot be expressed in words, presenting photographs as “documents” for others to read. In Japanese, the visual style of the photographs in Provoke has been described as: ‘are-bure-boke‘, which translates as ‘grainy/rough, blurry, out-of-focus‘. On 31 March 1970 the Provoke collective published the book Mazu tashikarashisa no sekai o suterō: Shashin to gengo no shisō (First, Throw Out Verisimilitude – Thoughts on photography and language). It was to the be the last publication of this short lived but influential group. Each of the participants went on to establish their own individual visions in their subsequent careers.
“Photography was too explanatory, too narrational for me. […] It was natural for me to join Provoke. […] They said they were photographing atmosphere. But I was very precise and careful. […] But my work changed after I saw how they worked. I saw that I could not control everything. I understood that photography is only a fragment. I used to be a photographer who interprets things via language. And then Provoke changed me.”
— Yakuta Takanashi
“The ambitious mission of Provoke to create a new photographic language that could transcend the limitations of the written word was declared with the launch of the magazine’s first issue. The year was 1968 and Japan, like America, was undergoing sweeping changes in its social structure. A questioning of traditional social conventions and a loss of confidence in existing political powers was happening in many creative disciplines across Japan and formed the foundation that fuelled Provoke’s mission. Unified under a manifesto that advocated conceptualism over realism, Provoke‘s photographers and writers moved beyond issues of what to photograph, and sought to uncover and question the essential nature of photography itself. The visual results flouted the precision of earlier documentary modes in favour of a less focused imagery that allowed for chance and the unknown to reveal itself in the photographic process.”
— Russet Lederman, 2012
Good Luck!
It is really important that you get off to a creative and productive start in your Exam preparation. You should aim to do something practical and photographic each week, either make new images with your camera or work digitally with images in post-production (Lightroom/ Photoshop/ Premiere.)
Those students who are disciplined and work with a real focus on a sustained investigation ie: go on shoots, experiment with images, explore ideas in-depth will achieve the highest marks and also enjoy the creative challenge of exploring an Exam paper.
Watch this video about John Baldessari narrated by Tom Waits as an inspiration first.
In the first week of the Exam preparation we want you to complete a photographic shoot where you break one of the rules of photography.
#1 The Rules of Objectivity – W. Eugene Smith, John Grierson, Mathieu Asselin
#2 The Rule of Audience – Lewis Hine, Daile Kaplan, Mark Neville
#3 The Rule of Manipulation – Steve McCurry, Errol Morris, Alice Wielinga
#4 The Rule of Reality – John Grierson, Peter Watkins, Joshua Oppenheimer, Cristina de Middle, Paula Paredes
#5 The Rule of Technicality – Laura El-Tantawy, Henrik Malmström
#6 The Rule of Ownership – Thomas Sauvin, Mishka Henner
#7 The Rule of the Camera – Donald Weber, Liz Orton
#8 The Rule of Rule Breaking – Olivia Arthur, Carolyn Drake
Deadline: Wed 28 February – all posts uploaded!
Extension: Choose a second rule to break and repeat the above process.
In essence if you follow the above 7 step process in your exam preparation you will fulfil all assessment criteria and work towards a set of final and successful photographic outcomes. 
Examination dates: Groups 13A and Group 13E 24 April, 30 April & 1 May. Group 13D 25 April – 2 and 3 May ~ 15 hrs controlled test over 3 days
The Theme: ‘FREEDOMS and/or LIMITATIONS’
Exam Paper: 2018 Exam Paper A2
Link to PLANNER for A2 EXAMINATIONS 2018
How to start – TASKS FOR H-TERM
2018 presentation with examples of Artists References from page 5 of exam booklet – showing evolution of artistic freedom
Preparatory Supporting Studies (Blog posts) – 6 weeks of lessons + 2 weeks Easter Break:
Prior to the timed examination you must produce and submit preparatory supporting studies which show why and how the supervised and timed work takes the form it does. You must produce a number of blog posts 25-30 that charts the development of your final piece from conception to completion and must show evidence of:
| Each week you are required to make a photographic response (still-images and/or moving image) that relates to the research and work that you explored in that week. Sustained investigations means taking a lot of time and effort to produce the best you can possibly do – reviewing, modifying and refining your idea and taking more pictures to build up a strong body of work with a clear sense of purpose and direction |
Controlled Exam 15 hrs over three days: (Final Outcome)
This time is for you to fine tune and adjust your final photographs using creative tools in Lightroom/Photoshop and/or complete a final edit of your film or video in Premiere . Your final outcome(s) must be presented in a thoughtful, careful and professional manner demonstrating skills in presenting work in either window mounts, picture frames, foam-board, and/ or make a BLURB photobook or submit moving image and video based production and embed as a Youtube clip on the blog.