Concept: The self portrait of Gwen John shows her isolation and struggle for recognition in a career dominated by men.
Location: I will position my model near a window with a clear background
Lighting: Natural Lighting from the side to create the similar soft effect and light shadow on one half of the face.
Camera Settings: Just clear focus on the subject
Props: I chose my model as I thought they looked similar to Gwen John. They will wear a shirt, tie and necklace backwards and ring earings. They will hold a grey cardigan over their arm.
This image is the inspiration behind my images. It is titled ‘Self-Portrait’ By Gwen John.
I decided not to use any of the images that had too many shadows in them.
Tom Hunter is an artist using photography and film, living and working in East London. He is Professor of Photography at the London College of Communications, University of the Arts, London, Honorary Fellow of the Royal Photographic Society and has an Honorary Doctorate from the University of East London. Tom has earned several awards during his career, his latest in 2016, the Rose Award for Photography at the Royal Academy, London.
^ Ophelia by John Millais
^The Geographer by Johannes Vermeer
Many of Tom’s series show he is inspired by famous artists such as Johannes Vermeer and John Millais, He even takes inspiration from Biblical Tableaux paintings.
Image Analysis:
-In Johannes Vermeer Painting titled ‘Girl Reading a Letter at an Open Window’ the open window is on one level intended to represent “the woman’s longing to extend her domestic sphere” beyond the constraints of her home and society, while the fruit “is a symbol of extramarital relations.” The letter that she holds is a love letter either planning or continuing her illicit relationship. Tom Hunter re-imagines this image in current times showing a woman reading a possession order that tells her she has to leave her home.
-Hunter uses natural lighting to hit the side of the woman’s face allowing for emphasis of her emotional state.
-The ISO that Tom uses appears to be low as the image is mainly darker in tone. This is used as an advantage to give focus to where the light hits, the woman and the baby.
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Like Tuschman, I was more inspired by Hopper’s Style to create my own work. Similarly, I used one subject in my photos to share the same meaning of isolation. In my photos, you can never see the eyes of the subject. This is supposed to deny the viewer from seeing the ‘windows to the soul’ and adds mystery to how the subject feels. I added the filter to reduce the warm temperature that was in the original images.
This image titled ‘Jo Sketching At Good Harbor Beach’ by Edward Hopper was probably my biggest inspiration for these images as I liked how the viewer was denied access to the eyes of the subject. It was also the reason I chose to feature a hat in my photos.
Location:A field with tall grass to give an overwhelming effect that the subject is surrounded yet alone
Lighting:Natural Lighting, however depends on weather
Camera Settings: Usual Camera settings
Props: A hat similar to the one featured in Edward Hopper's "Jo sketching at Good Harbor Beach"
I first decided to not use the images that featured the subject smiling as many of Hopper’s paintings depict a person alone and I also wanted to present this feeling of isolation.
Richard Tuschman began experimenting with digital imaging in the early 1990s, developing a style that synthesized his interests in photography, painting and assemblage. Tuschman holds a BFA from the University of Michigan in Ann arbor, and has been exhibited widely, both in the US and internationally. His photographs have been published on numerous online magazines/journals including Slate, LensCulture, LensScratch and Huffington Post. Tuschman lives and works in New York City.
Hopper Meditations is a photographic response to the work of the American painter, Edward Hopper. Richard Tuschman originally began by basing each work on a specific Hopper painting however progressed to create his own compositions inspired more by Hopper’s style and vision.
Tuschman created his own sets by digitally marrying dollhouse-size dioramas with live models. A lot of the furniture is standard dollhouse furniture, but he also made some himself. He photographed his models separately and photoshopped them into the scene.
Image Analysis
-The natural lighting in Hopper’s Painting is shown coming from a window, Tuschman recreates this with his own made set. The images have an overall quiet narrative presented by the emotional states of the models in both images. Richard Tuschman manages to heighten this feeling using dramatic lighting to create shadows around the model. However, Tuschman imagines the lighting almost as another character that echoes and evokes the inner life of the woman on the bed in comparison to Hopper who uses his lighting more harshly.
-The interior of the room has a cold temperature in comparison to outside the window which appears warmer, showing that isolation can be felt within.
-The woman in the painting, modeled after Hopper’s wife, Jo, faces the sun impassively and seemingly lost in thought. Her visible right eye appears sightless, emphasizing her isolation. The bare wall and the elevation of the room above the street also suggest the bleakness and solitude of impersonal urban life.
Many artists paintings hide secrets of the subjects in them or demonstrate the conventions of the time whether it be political or the social norms. Photographers are able to look at these mysterious pieces of art and become inspired by recreating aspects in a more modern style to represent current conventions. This inspired the premise of my project where I hope to be able to recreate styles of art, sections of a painting or even techniques.
Stephen Gill, born 1971 in Bristol, is a British experimental, conceptual and documentary photographer. He became interested in photography in his early childhood, thanks to his father and interest in insects and initial obsession with collecting bits of pond life to inspect under his microscope. He has had various collections exhibited in international museums including Tate and The Museum of London.
In January 2003 Gill bought a Bakelite 1960s box camera made by Coronet for 50 pence at Hackney Wick Sunday market, near where he lived. The camera had a plastic lens, and it lacked focus and exposure controls.
Over the next four years he had used the camera to photograph within the extremely varied environment of Hackney Wick, including waterways and allotments; and to make portraits of people at the Sunday market and who lived and worked in the area.
My Work
I was inspired by Gill’s combination of natural substances over urban imagery, I wanted to recreate this however could not use the same technique that he had used. Instead, I used an overlay technique where I cut out objects like leaves from one photo and placed it over another.
Like Gill, I took photos of the environment where I live. As I walked through town, I saw this mattress by a bin and decided to take a photo.
I erased the background using the rubber tool in Photoshop and placed the flower overlay where I thought fit.
Processed with VSCO with g3 preset
I added an overall filter in VSCO to make the whole image feel more like one layer.
This second image I took as I liked the formalistic structure of the scaffolding and believed it would stand out as the background of the overlay.
This image shows different angles, where the scaffolding is being looked up at but the berries are hanging down. This is metaphorical for what may be to come in the future for humankind in that there will be no nature left if we destroy it all to create man made structures.
The berries stand out in a more vibrant colour in contrast to the darker background demonstrating the true importance of nature.
The image as a whole shows elements of formalism, with the lines and structure of the scaffolding and colour of the berries. Combined together, it results in an abstraction with underlying meaning.
