Rocio Montoya

“Rocio Montoya (Madrid, 1983) is a photographer, graphic / web designer and editor based in Madrid, Spain. Her specialty is the experimental photography, land on which has moved from its creative inception. Also passionate for the editorial design, in 2010 she founded DOZE Magazine, which has co-directed and designed until its closure in June 2014.

Her interest is particularly focused on the portrait, approached through different plastic techniques and always with photography as the essential basis of each final artwork . Throughout her career as an artist she make a personal exploration of behaviors and emotional states of the human being, transforming reality by manipulating the image to convey their perception of the environment through aesthetic experiences.

She immersed herself in the field of visual arts by curiosity to express her concerns and the need to seek beauty as a means of escape and personal enjoyment. Her admiration for painting and surrealism is evident in addressing their creations, which you can see a clear trend to recreate atmospheres and distant situations to pure documentary reality, characterized by a delicate, haunting and poetic graphic style.

The human body in synergy with nature, the female figure and the loss of identity are the conceptual basis of her work.

One of her most recent interests is illustration, a field in which she began to submerge more conscientiously in 2018. With techniques such as watercolor, graphite and gouache Rocio has tackles new creations with a powerful chromatic charge and with women again as protagonists.

In addition to her personal work, Rocio Montoya has done numerous fashion editorials and has worked as a newspaper photojournalist.”
https://rociomontoya.com/bio/

Examples of Her Work:

Rocio Montoya

Rocio Montoya

Rocio Montoya

Rocio Montoya

Rocio Montoya

My Response:

For my response, I will be printing out the photos and sticking photos of plants and vines onto the photo of the models. I will be linking it to the journey of life, the flowers and vines coming out of the models represents life itself.

Photos I Will Be Using:


https://www.onlygfx.com/6-pink-rose-png-transparent/

https://www.pngkit.com/view/u2w7a9t4w7w7q8e6_butterfly-wings-png-butterfly-wings/

http://www.pngpix.com/download/flower-png-transparent-image-3

Final Outcomes:

Overall, I am really happy with how these photos came out. I think they capture Montoya’s style very well. I think if I had done them on the computer they would’ve looked a bit better, but I still like how they look on paper.

Day & Night

For my second response to Luke Fowler, I decided to take pictures in Mojacar during the day as well as the night. When two images are exposed in one frame, the viewer is able to see the relationship between the juxtaposed photographs.

I captured images during the day under natural light and used flash photography for some of the night time shots when there wasn’t enough light source to capture the image. When returning to the same location during the night, I had to make sure that I was in the same postition to get the exact composition as the day time image.

On Photoshop I included a black frame that surrounds the pair of images to replicate Luke Fowler’s two-frame films. I edited the images on VSCO to create a film effect to replicate his photography style.

Evaluation

Overall, I think the side by side comparison of the two images in day and night was successful because you get to see the same location under different lighting. The black frame helps to link the two images together while the comparative images using different levels of lighting creates contrast to emphasise the juxtaposition.

In order to improve upon my technique, I would change the order of my photoshoot and capture the nocturnal images first of all. A number of my night time images weren’t clear due to inadequate lighting, blurring and the limited range of the flash. After capturing clear images at night it would be much easier to replicate the same composition during the daytime. Additionally I would ensure that I had a tripod available to maintain camera stability and reduce movement that made some of my photos blurry.

New Topographics: Photoshoot 4

For my last photo shoot, in response to The New Topographic, I captured images of the mountainous landscape in Mojacar. However, in many images you can see how vehicles have destroyed the surface vegetation creating dry, compacted patches of dirt. Although the mountains and shrubs create a beautiful landscape, they have been partly destroyed by human actions. The destruction of the natural landscape links to The New Topographic because nature has been steadily degraded by mankind.

Like all the previous photoshoots in response to The New Topographic, the images have been edited on VSCO with filter and grain.

Contact Sheet
My Response

New Topographics: Photoshoot 3

For my third photo shoot in response to The New Topographics, I decided to capture images in Stephen Shore’s photography style. He was known for his use of colour in photographs to increase the sense of detachment. Shore would often photograph intersections and roadside landscape.

I captured several images of the roadside landscape in Mojacar. All the images depict how man has altered the land by damaging vegetation and constructing roads. The combination of nature and urban development emphasise the concept of man having control over the landscape.

Once I selected the best images on the contact sheet, I downloaded them onto my phone and added the filter vivd warm because of the intense warm effect. This replicates Stephen Shore’s use of colour in his photographs and the film effect. The filter also intensifies the blue sky making the image appear vintage along with the grain.

Contact Sheet
Final Outcomes
Evaluation

My final outcomes have been successful because they reflect the control and power humans have over the landscape. The images depict a landscape altered by humans and reflect the growing unease about how the natural landscape is being eroded by urban growth. Works labelled The New Topographic show the relationship between man and nature through the photographic documentation of anthropogenic influences upon the land and scenes of suburban sprawl. The banal aesthetic can also be seen through the simple compositions of my photographs. The barren nature of the landscape in the southeast corner of Spain emphasise the monotonous uniformity of the urban features laid upon it.

My Recreations of my Images

These are the selection of images that I will use as my final piece. After manipulating the images on adobe lightroom and adjusting settings such as contrast, vibrancy, highlights, shadows, whites, blacks, cropping, changing to monochrome, saturation, vibrancy and clarity. 

The first two images that I have inserted below are similar to the original image in terms of the subjects are both holding animals in both the old and recreated photo, a similar(ish) stance is also replicated in the new photos and the emotions/ facial expressions are similar. The images are of my dad. My dad has always shared a love for animals, and these images clearly portray that. Unfortunately animals don't tend to have a long life span, however these images show that although death occurs, life can also begin as other animals are brought into their lives.


For the images of my dad, the original image was taken on his travels in Australia. There aren't any koala bears in Jersey anyway, however I still wanted to replicate my dad holding an animal so I thought it was best fit that I recreated him holding my dog Salty instead. I like the colour scheme in both the images, it's almost like the denim blue of my dads shirt in the first image swapped with the background of the recreational image, and the white background of the original image swapped onto my dads t-shirt in the recreational image. I also like how both the koala bear and the dog are looking in the same direction. I also took this photo on my iPhone 7.
I decided not to recreate this image of myself, my sister and my grandma, and instead just simply rework into the image. I am inspired by Carole Benitah's 'à la plage'. Especially the cut out of the figures in it. What I plan to do is to cutout my grandma from the image, then sew around her cut out. I will also get a separate piece of paper and place glitter on it. I will then glue the photo on top of the paper so only the cutout of my grandma will display the glitter. My reasoning for doing this is that I want to expand on the negative space. My grandma was also a very glamorous lady, and the glitter can display some elements of that glitter. My reasoning for cutting out my grandma  is that she has now passed away, and although she is in that photo, the loss of her feel like there's almost a hole that's missing from my childhood.
A manipulated image of myself, my sister and my grandma when I was a young child.
For this recreation image, I decided to take some elements of the original image, but change up the image as well. I decided to change the subjects in the image to our family friends, I also changed the location of the image - the original image was taken in Ireland, to our family friends garden, I also changed the angle of the shot to a one closer to both the subjects and to the ground. I like how there are trees in both of the image as it shows that all children no matter what age of time still like playing outside in gardens. I also like how the element of playfulness remains in both images and the innocence that remains in the recreation image. I took this photo with a DSLR camera and used a 50mm lens. 
For this final piece I am incorporating a few elements. I recreated my mum with my little sister, however I decided to keep the school photo of myself and my sister and will be cutting us out with a Stanley knife and then inserting ourselves into the recreational image. I'm doing this because both of the photos of me were taken at a similar time, and I remember meeting my little sister almost like it was recently. Therefore although time has changed and my little sister has grown up, the memory is still fresh and young in my mind. To take the photo I used an iPhone 7. 

Exam Evaluation

When given the theme Journey’s and Pathway’s, I immediately had an idea about a physical journey, such as an outing of some sort. At the beginning, I wanted to stick with just landscapes, but as I carried on, I started working more with photo montage. I really enjoyed working with photo montage as I think some of my best photos have been from using that method of photography. Also, I really enjoyed street photography and capturing people’s journeys to their final destinations.

The first photographer I decided to research was Andrew S. Gray. I had already looked at this photographer in my Pre AS task, but I wanted to further explore his work and his technique of taking photos. I enjoyed working with ICM as it creates very interesting and unique photos, and I really liked the final images I had from this section of my journeys and pathways theme.

The next portion of this theme I explored bus journeys. I found the photographer Stephen Calcutt on Pinterest. He goes around London and takes photos of people through vandalised bus stops. I really like how he mixes the bus stops with the people, kind of a juxtaposition of life and death. I think the photos I took for this portion were very good and I liked how I edited them on photo shop.

Next, the idea of physical journeys sparked my ideas and street photography instantly came to mind. I researched a bunch of street photographers and found the photographer Damian Chrobak. I really liked the simpleness and emotions that his work portrayed, so I decided to go to town and take photos that captured uniqueness and individuality. I am really happy with how these sets of photos came out and one photo from this project was probably one of my favourite photos from this theme.

After working more street photography, I looked at buildings and car journeys. I went to the St Saviours abandoned hospital with my mum and on the way there, I took some photos of things I saw. I wasn’t satisfied with the photos I took as I feel they were lacking something special and they just looked okay, which isn’t what I was looking for.

Next, I started looking more into photo montage. I found 4 artists that I really loved and wanted to pull inspiration from. Ryan Mulford, Rocio Montoya, Merve Ozaslan and Marko Köppe. I really liked how all these photographers edited there photos, and I really like editing photos on photo shop with this style of photography. I also printed photos out and stuck other photos on top of them. I really enjoyed working in this style, which is why my final photos for this exam were all photo montage.

Overall, I am really happy with the outcome of this theme and I really enjoyed using different techniques and styles. One thing that I could’ve done better was to open up my ideas a bit and explore different types of photography and print out a few more photos, but I am still satisfied with how I did things.

Display For Exam Outcomes

Image Set One:

For my first set of A5 images, I will be putting them on a large piece of foam board. I decided to keep the background white as I feel black clashes with the images. Also, the white background makes the photos stand out.

Image Set 2:

For my second set of photos, I will be putting them on a A3 piece of black card. I think this makes the photos stand out and the contrast between the black and blue works really well.

Third Image:

For my third image I will be mounting it onto foam board as I want the photo to be the center of attention, and if there was a background, I think it would take away from the image.

Display Ideas for Exam

Photo Mount on Thick Paper:

I like the idea of photo mounts, but, I have used them many times in my past projects so I think I won’t be using this method of display.

Foam Board:

Image result for foam board display photography

http://lizcagephotography2.blogspot.com/2012/06/year-1-core-assignment-review.html

I really like the idea of displaying my photos on foam board for a clean and simple look. I think this may be one technique that I might use for my exam.

For my exam I will displaying my photos on foam board as I think it gives a very simple, chic and clean feel to the images.

Final Ideas for Exam

For my final images, I wanted to mix the physical journeys with portraits that I have taken. I also wanted to play with photo montage with landscapes I have taken. I will also be using the style of Marko Köppe again as I really enjoyed that style of photo montage.

Idea 1 –

Images I will use:

Print A3

Idea Two –

Images I Will Use:

Print Out Original size

Idea 3 –

Images I will use:

Print out A5 Size

I decided to pick these photos I did from my Makro Köppe project as I really liked how they turned out and I think they capture my idea of mixing industrial and modern buildings with nature.

CONTACT SHEETS FROM STEPHEN GILL PHOTO SHOOT 1/2

For this first photo shoot I set out in the evening and I wanted to capture much darker images with minimal exposure in order to create a much darker and effective photograph. For this particular photo shoot i ended up photographing a the majority of plants, trees and nature and to me that would allow me to have more opportunities for editing in the future. Along side that factor, when photographing these images positioning and point of view of the camera was something I really wanted to concentrate on. I included image where the camera was pointing straight down, straight up, in front off and at diagonals.


Red= I will definitely not use, either not focused enough, no what I expect or simply just have better images that I can use instead
Yellow= I will maybe use or maybe use part of the image (cropping) or with the right effects and editing will end up being efficient to use
Green= I will most likely lose, really like that particular photo, or particular part of the photo

PHOTO SHOOT 2- CONTACT SHEET

For this photos shoot I wanted to do something completely different to the previous shoot in order to allow me to a have a variety of images. First of all I chose my location that would have the best sunset lighting so grasp the best quality images with the correct warmth feeling. I ended up going to St Ouens before sunset and simply walking along the beach and taking images of anything that caught my eye at the time. The ripples in the water with the sun reflecting of the water gave an extremely good effect, along side the foot print in the sand. This is where I got one of my final pieces from, of the stone wall and bright blue sky, and placed with the perfect moon.


Red= I will definitely not use, either not focused enough, no what I expect or simply just have better images that I can use instead
Yellow= I will maybe use or maybe use part of the image (cropping) or with the right effects and editing will end up being efficient to use
Green= I will most likely lose, really like that particular photo, or particular part of the photo