The story about my great grandfather Mashhoor Hadeetha Al-Jazi as told in my photobook got me thinking about war and how war has been photographed. The military has always played a significant part in my family. Nine members of my family have all had a distinguished career in the Jordanian military, but my great-grandfather’s, who was a Jordanian army commander in the Battle of K has always fascinated me and to a large extent influenced me in following in his footsteps. In this essay I will be investigating how war in the Middle East has been documented in photographs. This study will be based around analyzing a set of images from my great-grandfather’s Battle at and compare those images to images of recent conflicts in the region
The Purpose of War Photography: I am really effected by the way wars have changed over time and how now a days war is much easier due to the industrial revolution some countries can destroy a whole other country from the comfort of an office. And years ago soldiers had to actually go on battle fields and put their lives at risk and that is how I lost my great grandfather. “If war truly is a force that gives us meaning, photography is a force that gives us a means by which to envision that meaning.” (Bob Duggan,2012:1) Duggan is saying that photography of war is just as important as the war itself or else the war wouldn’t have much meaning.
This is my favorite war photographs, it was taken in 1964 in the Karamah Battle and you can see Mashhour in the front taking the lead. With his great heroic character as seen in the photograph wearing his CO uniform giving him this leader image. This photograph was taken by a war journalist back then when they had to be embedded within a troop risking their life to take these photographs that are the most important aspect of a war to complete its meaning as if there is a war without much photographs not many people will give it their attention, as the sad reality is that what people haven’t seen to them it hasn’t happened. The photographer took this photograph while Mashhour was leading his troop towards the war field and he took it just in time when you can see even though they’re headed towards war Mashhour still had a smile on his face which represent how proud he was to be the one chosen to lead these heroes to bring independence to their country. They were barging through the grass reaching half way their height, off road marching on the desert sands, waiting patiently for something to happen.
The photograph was taken under natural day light where the broad day desert sun light was positioned from above, making the photograph a bit over exposed mean while giving it a good glare. The aperture was made to be a wide range giving the photograph a deep depth of field but due to the poor quality of lenses at that time the photograph was not very focused and gave the image that small blare effect. And high speed shutter speed wasn’t available at that time so it there was a slight motion blur. The chosen shutter speed gave the photograph high grain. More over, the white balance of the camera settings made the photograph quite warm. The combination of the grass and soldiers give the image textural quality that is ‘busy’ to look at. The color of their uniform blends in with the background. And the combination of the dark soldiers with the bright environment gave the image more quality.
This is a recent photograph of a modern day war in Afghanistan taken on November 2001, these american marines where in a country that isn’t theirs and were fighting the locals in it. You can see the difference between this photograph and the old photograph of the Karamah battle, in this photo it represents how much the soldiers had to carry on their back as there is too much evolved technology so war became more competitive with time. These marines look very exhausted as they’re walking through the sunny desert sun with a lot of load on them. Further more, in the Karamah battle photograph the background was just of an old tank which is what they used to use in the old days meanwhile the back ground of this photograph is off a more evolved and technological weaponry vehicle which is a helicopter. And i believe that war now a days is not as much effort taking but if more destructive as to the evolution of weaponry which increased competition between nations.
This photograph was taken using a state of the art camera which is easier to use as its lighter with better quality and finally more settings option. This photograph was taken with the sunlight that’s positioned facing the soldiers as the main source of light, you can see that as the reflection of the light on their faces prove it. And that brightness made the image over exposed with a slight glare. And the advanced lens was more focused with a deep depth of field making it sharp. Due to the option of faster shutter speed with new cameras. The shadow effect on the soldier’s faces contribute to the secrecy of them. The white balance on the photo though made it quite cold. The pattern of the soldiers walking in a single file behind each other on the arid land gave the photograph a good pattern quality.
War photography was harder to achieve good quality photographs in the old times although it was easier to have access to war. Zooms were then clumsy, heavy and of poor optical quality. Meanwhile digital cameras today can automatically adjust the film speed setting to the available light, are much better than film in very low light, have rapid auto focus, and can be used with zooms that give good optical quality across a wide range. With a laptop and a satellite phone, pictures can be adjusted and sent to the publisher within minutes, while in the old times the photographer had to keep his camera safe with them until they reached back to their base, but if they got stuck on the way or died then the photographs will never be published. And unfortunately now a days there is so many restrictions on taking photographs in a war zone mostly because the countries with the greater power don’t want to show the world what they are doing so basically no photographs that show evidence of war is allowed in these countries, which is very discomforting as people are just sitting in their homes doing there daily stuff normally around the world and have no clue about what is actually happening in these countries with war. What is even worse is that now editing photographs is very easily done so countries with more power can just easily edit a photograph that shows something disturbing to show something normal from the comfort of an office.
In conclusion after doing my research on the purpose of war photograph and got deep in it, i found out how important a photographer can be, as if a war didn’t have any photographs it would have much meaning to the people who weren’t there. And then that lead me to questioning how war changed with time and evolution of technology. And the most artist who inspired me but i didn’t mention her a lot was Julian Stallabrass who went and risked her life in the Iraq war to get the finest of war photographs, and used her words through my essay to direct me on the right path of war photograph.
Bibliography Julian,S.(2013) Photoworks. Grand Parade, Brighton, BN2 9
How does Carolle Benitah and Claudia Ruiz Gustafson explore their past as a method of understanding identity?
“For most people, looking at a snapshot does not only make one sad for the time or person gone but can also trigger memories of the past, bringing them right back into the present in the mind of the viewer. Photographs, whether happy or sad, and especially family ones, work on both memory and remembrance – at the same time representing a memory and calling us to remember – and they hold a very special and important place in our lives.” (Bright and Van Erp 2019:37)
Through my personal investigation, I am going to focus on my mobile family life and how this lifestyle has effected me as an individual. I will explore how living in different countries has allowed me to gain cultural knowledge, new experiences and memories. It has ultimately shaped who I am and how I perceive the world. I will explore my mixed identity and the different cultures I have been exposed to by starting the narrative from the beginning. Creating collages and manipulating archival images will help me tell the story of how my mother and father met and fell in love in Peru. Since my father is a geography teacher, he takes the opportunity to go travelling whenever he can. Through applying to jobs in different countries, he ended up in Peru which is where he met my mother Isabel. I want to present their love story and display the events that followed after their marriage.
I will be investigating the two visual artists Carolle Benitah and Claudia Ruiz Gustafson who explore family, memory, displacement and identity from their own point of view. Through the use of vintage family photographs and the use of different mediums, these artists uncover family stories and create complex, multidimensional narratives to reflect upon what they have left behind while shifting countries and at the same time honouring and remembering family traditions. I have chosen to investigate Carolle Benitah because of the visual aspects portrayed in her work. For my own personal investigation, I would also like to manipulate and physically edit my archival imagery through artistic techniques, whether that may be sewing, drawing or cutting. She demonstrates her feelings towards her childhood from her current perspective, which is what I intend to do in my own project. Claudia Ruiz Gustafson is my second reference since her autobiographical, self reflective series Historias Fragmentadas has inspired me to make my own digital compositions. Like Gustafson, I want to use archival images and documents to explore my past and cultural identity. To respond to her work, I will be juxtaposing, tearing and layering family photographs in order to tell a personal story.
Before I begin addressing my work or the chosen photographers, I think it’s important to recognise the photographic history that influenced both projects I am analysing within this investigation. Having looked into a variety of artistic/photographic movements, I was interested by Dadaism and the way in which it linked into my personal study. Dadaism or Dada was a form of artistic anarchy born out of disgust for the social, political and cultural values of the time. It embraced elements of art, music, poetry, theatre, dance and politics. Dada was not a style of art like Cubism or Fauvism; Instead it was more a protest movement with an anti-establishment platform. There was a clear motive behind this movement. However, it is not the social, political and cultural issues behind the artworks that I am interested in. Although I admire the intentions of Dadaism, I am more intrigued by the visual aspects within the movement.
Dada began in Zürich, Switzerland and arose as a reaction to World War I and the nationalism that many thought had led to the war. The results of Dadaism were extremely diverse, ranging from performance art to poetry, photography, sculpture, paintings and collage. Dada’s aesthetic, obvious by its mockery of materialistic and nationalistic attitudes, was a powerful influence on artists in many cities, including Berlin, Hanover, Paris, New York and Cologne, all of which generated their own groups. The movement dissipated with the creation of Surrealism, but the ideas it gave rise have become the foundations of various categories of modern and contemporary art.
Left: Max Ernst – Anatomie als Braut, 1921 / Right: Herbert Bayer – Lonesome City Dweller
Cut with a Kitchen Knife Dada through the Last Weimar Beer Belly Cultural Epoch of Germany (1919) Artist: Hannah Höch
In Berlin, one of the most popular mediums among the Dadaists was photography. Using scissors and glue, they made photomontage, with photographic images taken from the press. The realism of these images helped transmit the dreadful scenery of combat and death accurately and effectively. Photoshop is an example of how photomontage has developed into an advanced practice. With this software we can create photo-montages by layering and merging images together in order to create a new result.
I believe that Dadaism links to the photographic work that I have produced for my personal project. The photographers involved in the Dada movement would create collages of separate photographs that is re-photographed so that the final image is converted back into a seamless photographic print. I have carried out a similar approach by layering archival images of my own family photographs into one digital collage. Although my work does not address social, political and cultural issues like the Dada movement, I am creating collages in order to explore the past as well as my own cultural identity.
Carolle Benitah’s series Photo Souvenirs explores the memories of her Moroccan childhood by reworking and threading old family snapshots. She uses beads, coloured thread and scissors in order to alter her family photo albums to explore her memories during childhood as a way to understand her current identity. Benitah became interested in her family pictures when she looked through a family album and found herself “overwhelmed by an emotion”. She explains that the photographs represented “me, spoke about me and my family, told things about my identity, my place in the world, my family history and its secrets, the fears that constructed me, and many other things that contributed to who I am today”.
The artist says that she “excavated” images in which she appears from family albums and chose snapshots that relate to memories and loss. Benitah carried out a process of order, classification, scanning and then printing. She never manipulates the original photo. Once the images are chosen, she starts to tell her version of the story. Benitah explains that “The past of a human being, is neither permanent or finished, but reconstructed in the present time”. I find it interesting how Benitah doesn’t do anything directly on the original image. If you manipulate the original, then it would be changed forever. However, there is some sort of dedication that comes when adjusting the original since you are essentially rewriting your past and making a statement.
For the last step she adds needlework. Embroidering is principally a feminine activity. Waiting was associated to this activity: women embroidered, hoping for the man to return home. Embroidery is strongly linked to the environment in which she grew up in. Girls in a good family used to learn how to sew and embroider which were essential activities for “perfect women”. She uses embroidery with a purpose, a decorative function to re-interpret her own history and expose its failings. “With each stitch I make a hole with a needle. Each hole is putting a death of my demons. It’s like an exorcism. I make holes in paper until I am not hurting any more.”
I selected Benitah due to the visual aspects portrayed in her work. For my own personal investigation, I would like to manipulate and physically edit my archival imagery through artistic techniques, whether that may be sewing, drawing or cutting. Her series Photo Souvenirs captivated my interest since her artistic manipulations can be interpreted in different ways since they are not direct and obvious in their message. Therefore, the viewers must analyse the illustrations and come up with their own reasoning as to why Benitah chose to create these marks as a form of self reflection. This means that Benitah’s personal story remains personal since only she knows her true intentions behind each work. In order to explore her cultural identity and reflect on childhood memories, Benitah displays her current feelings based on the snapshots captured through artistic alterations which is what I intended to do with my project as well.
Les Cafards (The cockroaches)
This piece is an example of Carolle Benitah exploring her past as a method of understanding identity. The photograph above has been scanned and then manipulated using embroidery. By manipulating the photograph, she is returning to an old memory and imprinting current thoughts and messages within the past. This archival family photograph has most likely been captured by a family member whilst she lived in Morocco. Carolle Benitah has embroidered red thread where both children have linked hands together. This area is the main visual element of the image since it is the only colour feature in the entire frame. As viewers, we know they are related because of the red string bounding their hands together. Their connection cannot be broken. Like all the collages within the series Photo Souvenirs, Benitah uses red thread with a purpose. It leads Benitah to her past history. This vibrant yet deviant of all colours showcases its spectrums between love and hate, pain and joy, life and death. The children are surrounded by embroidered cockroaches which invade the space but they have angel’s wings and the fraternal links protect her and saves her. Like I have mentioned before, what I’m most fascinated about this collage in particular is how the visual alterations within the work are completely up to the viewer’s interpretation. It doesn’t really make any sense to the viewers since the concept is not personal to us but is for the artist. She has simply illustrated her ideas and how she views the moment that has been captured.
Originally from Lima, Perú, Claudia Ruiz Gustafson is a fine art photographer based in Massachusetts. Her work is mainly autobiographical and self reflective. Claudia Ruiz Gustafson grew up in a conservative middle class family in Perú and moved to the US when she was in her twenties. As time passed and the last of her grandparents died, Claudia felt compelled to bring attention to what she had left behind, being the only person in her family who left her country of origin “For me the hardest part was not to be able to spend the last years of my grandparents’ lives with them. My grandmother was the pillar of my family, the story teller and the story keeper of our family’s history. I knew she wanted me to continue this tradition”. This series helped Claudia to look deeper into her past by exploring memories and the emotion of loss.
In her series, Historias fragmentadas (Fragmented stories), she creates digital compositions from images of the past. By tearing, juxtaposing elements from the past and the present, layering archival documents, fragments from her journals and objects from her childhood, she has shed light on a personal story within an ancestral story that spans generations. Continuing her exploration to recall what she has lost, Claudia uses staged imagery, mostly self portraits, to transport her physical presence into the spiritual past as seen in the compositions. This series exposes the vulnerability of childhood, a longing for a time gone by and the truths of a particular Latin American Family.
I have chosen Claudia Ruiz Gustafson as my second reference for my personal investigation because her self reflective series Historias Fragmentadas has inspired me to make my own digital compositions through Photoshop. I intend to use archival images depicting my family in order to look into the past and explore memories. Like Claudia, I will explore my cultural identity by juxtaposing, tearing and layering archival images and documents in order to tell a personal story. In order to continue the exploration of my cultural identity, I have created photo-montages which merges self portraits with archival images to exhibit how living in different countries has shaped me as an individual.
Llena eres de gracia (Full of Grace)
This digital collage displays layers of different archival material combined together into one seamless photographic print. She often employs family snapshots in collages that are layered with textures and fabrics to reveal a longing for childhood and a person or place left behind. It is clear from my research on the photographer, that the purpose for creating this collage was to bring attention to someone she had left behind who presumably died when she moved to the US. Her layered compositions in the Historias Fragmentadasseries offer at times a playful sense of memory and in others a mournful sense of loss and longing. In this case, she has created the collage as a remembrance to one of her family members. This photograph is from Claudia’s family archive that she has inherited from a relative. The portrait in the middle of the composition depicts a middle aged woman in glam. It is a head shot in back and white film of a relative of Claudia whether that may be her mother or grandmother. The Portrait image is torn precisely in half, signifying that her mother/grandmother has passed away. The colour red makes an appearance. It seems to be some sort of fabric which runs down the middle of the frame. This probably signifies that although the individual has died, the family blood line still remains. In the middle of the torn portrait, there is a fragment of paper, perhaps from her childhood journal or a letter she has received from the individual in the image. This acts as a momento and reminds Claudia of her place of origin since the writing on the lined paper is in Spanish which is the official language in Peru.
The research on both these photographers has influenced my personal project, which focuses on my mobile family life and how this lifestyle has effected me as an individual. To investigate my cultural identity, I created collages by sewing and layering archival images which are aspects inspired by both artists. I will be looking at some of the different methods I used and visuals I created and what they represent. The first image features two archival photographs combined together into one digital collage. Both images were taken in Austria, a country I used to live in during my younger years. The top image within the collage, depicts me and my mother embracing each other which demonstrates our strong connection as mother and daughter. I only made alterations to the image below which depicts me as a child surrounded by deer sculptures. I have replicated Benitah’s series Photo Souvenirs by reworking old family snapshots with a red graphic ink pen. I created red illustrations on top of the image as a metaphor for leaving my traces behind in each country. To incorporate an element of Claudia’s work, I scanned a cloth originating from Vienna to act as the border. The second digital collage tells the story of when my father moved to Peru. Since my father is a geography teacher, he takes the opportunity to go travelling whenever he can. Through applying to jobs in different countries, he ended up in Peru which is where he met my mother Isabel. The two images within the collage showcase the culture in Peru and the different locations he visited once he arrived. The photograph below depicts my father visiting Machu Picchu for the first time, an iconic landmark in Peru. On the right side is a piece of Peruvian fabric I decided to incorporated into my digital collage. Creating photo-montages has helped me explore my mixed identity and the different cultures I have been exposed to during childhood. I have manipulated my archival imagery through artistic techniques, whether that may be sewing or drawing. It is a form of self reflection to explore how living in different countries has allowed me to gain cultural knowledge, new experiences and memories.
Both Carolle Benitah and Claudia Ruiz Gustafson explore the memories of their childhood by reworking old family snapshots. They both grew up in their country of origin and shifted when they started their photography career. Carolle Benitah lived in Morocco during her childhood but then made the decision to move to France, whereas Claudia Ruiz Gustafson moved from Peru over to the US in her twenties. Both Photo Souvenirs and Historias Fragmentadas are autobiographical and self reflective since they use their current perspective based on their childhood in order to alter the archival images artistically. Benitah uses beads, thread and scissors in order to change her family photos, whereas Claudia tears, juxtaposes elements from the past and present, layers archival documents and images from her childhood. Benitah and Claudia have similar intentions for their projects since they both explore their past in order to understand their identity. Benitah created the series Photo Souvenirssince her archival photographs evoked strong emotions as she looked through her family albums. She uses the photographs to explore herself, her family, her identity, her place in the world and many other things that contributes to who she is today. On the other hand, Claudia uses her archival imagery in order to bring attention to what she left behind in her country of origin. Moreover, the colour red has great significance in both their work although used with different purposes. Carolle Benitah uses red thread because it leads her to her past history. The vibrant yet deviant of all colours showcases its spectrums between love and hate, pain and joy, life and death. Claudia Ruiz Gustafson uses the colour red within her digital compositions because it represents the blood line among family members. Although both photographers create collages, they craft them using different methods and techniques. Claudia produces collages digitally by scanning each image separately and then layering them together using Photoshop, whereas Carolle makes artistic alterations on the image physically and afterwards scans the result in order to have a final seamless photographic print. Unlike Benitah, Claudia continues her investigation based on her cultural identity by using self portraits and staged imagery in order to transport her physical presence into the spiritual past.
In summary, I can conclude that photography as a medium can be used to explore memory, displacement and identity as demonstrated by the work of Benitah and Gustafson. It was insightful to investigate the way in which individuals illustrate their current perspective within their art through different methods and mediums. Attempting to convey a personal story and feelings through a traditional photograph is problematic because it is difficult to connect the viewer with the artists work especially if they don’t know their intentions or the symbolism behind certain aspects. In response to this dilemma, artists such as Benitah and Gustafson have drawn inspiration from the Dada movement by physically manipulating images and creating collages. I have learned about photographys potential and the way in which time frames can be altered and depicted through images. The work from these two photographers are heavily reliant upon the past and archival childhood images. Both artists inspired my work throughout my personal investigation and I am satisfied with my final outcomes since I have fulfilled my desire to experiment with as many materials and methods as possible, both traditional and digital. Every collage and image that I have used within my study has helped me tell the story of my mobile family life and how this lifestyle has effected me as an individual. Ultimately, I wanted to explore my mixed identity and how being exposed to different cultures through childhood has shaped me as an individual.
On a basic level I believe my exploration into the terms of occupation and liberation went well. The terms were broad and allowed me to consider many different opportunities to explore, but I felt looking at the occupation my Grandparents lifestyle was a perfect fit. At first I was a little worried as I knew my portraits were not always my strong point within photography, but I knew it would allow me to refine and develop me skills within this area of photography. Using artists such as Walker Evans, LaToya Ruby Frazier, Laura Blight and many allowed me to explore different ways to present my Grandparents lifestyle through portraits and landscapes. Initially, I wanted to focus of both my Grandma and Grandad but as my project developed I made the decision to place the central focus on my Grandad due to his higher position within the family hierarchy and how he considers himself the backbone of the household. At first, I looked at just capturing portraits and understood that my narrative of my book would need a change of pace and so I decided to explore the interior and exterior of their house and the relationship between landscape and person. In terms of photographic styles my project follows a documentary style as I try and capture the reality of my Grandparents lifestyle. I often found it challenging to produce reliable imagery as I did not want to ‘intrude’ on my Grandparents, but I felt as the project went along the bond between me and my Grandparents became stronger allowing me to decode their lifestyle more.
Overall, the six photo shoots conducted I was able to produce high quality photographs which illustrate my competence of using a camera and its settings. Most of my photographs are in black and white as I felt it showcased detail, structure and space much clearer and I felt the context of the 1940’s, when my Grandparents was born, was much clearer. I tended not to deviate from a naturalistic edit as I felt that the authenticity of my photographs would be reduced, thus reducing the reliability of my outcomes. However, to show further exploration I decided to take a more contemporary route, and although I liked the way they looked I felt it did not follow my aesthetic and did not show my narrative and contextual and conceptual elements in the right way. The project itself has taught me a lot about my family and the way in which lifestyle affects the way in which my Grandparents live their life. It has allowed me to become much closer with my Grandparents and the final book is something that they will cherish, thus making it a worth while and rewarding project to do.
With regard to my final outcomes, I believe I have successfully managed to show my competence in display techniques. I have been able to artistically express my intended narrative within my imagery, whilst being able to uphold the authenticity of the photograph through the simplistic and basic looking framing techniques. I have successfully shown my creatively ability to combine photographs within a frame to illustrate a new element of their lifestyle which adds to the overall conceptual and contextual values of my work. Individually the photographs themselves, printed out, show the high quality of work, which reflects my ability to produce crisp images as well as edit the photographs for effect. Personally, I really like the way in which these outcomes have turned out as they outcast my best embodiment of work within the project, and how they reflect my narrative.
As my other final outcome, my photographic book clearly illustrates my intended narrative of representing my Grandparents lifestyle, and how the 1940’s has influenced this, with specific focus onto religion, family structure and hierarchy, relationship and interaction. The final sequencing of my photographs, clearly represent my intended effect, through the use of intimate portraits as well as landscape interior and exterior images which present a new light to my narrative. Within this period of making the book I have been able to show my ability to effectively sequence my photographs for intended effect, whilst still conveying my narrative. As well as, producing a captivating book which my Grandparents will cherish.
To conclude, I believe through the six photo shoots and different final outcomes, I have showcased my ability to experiment and explore the concept of Occupation and Liberation in a more contemporary route. In addition to this, I have shown my ability to develop an idea from artists work as well as the inspiration of my overall aesthetic which developed as the project went on. Personally, I am pleased with the way in which this project has went as I have held authenticity within my work, produced strong images, shown my ability to successfully edit images as well as sequence them to be placed in a book. In terms of my essay, I believe I have conducted a lot of research and reading to form a well structured and thought out essay, which has relevance to my project. On top of this, the essay allowed me to take this project into a deeper meaning, which is clearly shown within my work.
It all started when Talal’s Jordanian Grandfather Wael got his student visa and went to Bristol to study in college, while he was doing that he met Talal’s English grandmother Sherree in the same college and they fell in love, and had their first child later on which was Talal’s mother “Jumanah. After they had Jumanah, Wael’s student visa ran out so he had to go back to Jordan and left Sherree with two options which were either to stay in England and raise a child on her own or go live with him in a country she has never been to and barley knows anything about.
So Sherree being just young and in love chose option two and went to Jordan, where she discovered over the time that it’s not easy for an English women to live a normal western life in a middle eastern country, where women’s rights are different and what I like to refer to as “cultural clash” kicked in and created the differences between Sherree and Wael and these differences later on separated them when Jumanah was only 4 years old. So Sherree left and went back to her home country and Wael couldn’t raise a kid on his own so left Jumanah with her auntie and her auntie’s husband Muhammad Al-Jazi who raised her. So Talal always saw Muhammad as a Grandfather figure because he was practically the one who raised his mother.
Muhammad Al-Jazi and
“the knife”
Muhammad (AKA: Abu Ali) was the kind of person who always lived his life on the edge as he was one of the most adventurous people in Talal’s life. So one day he invited Talal to go with him to his small hunting house which was located in Ma’an in Jordan, and that was one of the most traditional places in Jordan with only a few houses and a lot of desert land so they went Jar-boa hunting in the morning then went back to his summer house for lunch and that’s where Talal being his touchy self-wanting to touch and play with anything he can get his hands on, picked up an outstanding antique knife Abu Ali had in the middle of his desk on a fancy stand, out of curiosity Talal opened the case of the knife and while he was doing that Abu Ali just realized what he was doing so screamed: “NO! Talal!” So Talal got jump scared and dropped the knife on the floor where the lion head on the end of the knife broke into three pieces as it was some type of ceramic. So he looked at Talal and said that this was a really precious thing to him so Talal asked him why was it? and he replied by telling Talal to take it with him back home and to fix it, so he can give it back to Abu Ali as it was before, in order for him to tell Talal the story behind it.
The terrible death of Abu
Ali
As they were heading back home to the city Amman they went to see a buggy shop on the way as Abu Ali was curious to see the new buggies they got, so they went inside and as Abu Ali was looking around he found a nice dirt ATV and hopped on it to ask Talal how he looked on it, and he replied by informing him how much it suits him, so he bought it on the spot and they told him that they will deliver it to his farm house next day. So Talal went back home and everything was fine until he woke up next day to the noise of crying coming from his parents room, so Talal instantly thought that his great grandmother passes away because she was very poorly with cancer at that time so it just felt normal to him so he just started crying then his dad came into his room with his eyes all filled up with tears then he asked Talal why was he crying and he told him: “did my great grandma pass away?” And he replied: “no son she’s still fine but a couple of hours ago in the morning your grandpa Abu Ali got an ATV delivered to his farm so he got too excited and took it right away for a test drive, then went on a dirt path at the top of a mountain where he was going down the path and went straight into the valley where two farmers found his body beaten like a rag doll and called the ambulance so a helicopter came and took him right away where he passed away mid-way to the hospital on the helicopter”. And Talal just had the weirdest feeling as he knew it was true but just couldn’t believe it in the same time because his head just didn’t process the information because he was just with him the day before when he was in perfect health.
The story behind the knife
After being in shock behind the story Talal heard he started to process that his grandfather actually passed away a couple of days after the incident. So on the third day of the funeral Talal was with Hamza which is Abu Ali’s eldest son and Talal asked him: “what should I do with the knife because I was supposed to give it back to him after fixing it.” So Hamza was really surprised when he showed him the knife and Hamza said: “that’s a really antique and priceless knife you have there.”, then Talal asked him if he knew the story behind it and he told him all about it.
What Talal
learnt about his family history.
After Hamza told Talal about the story behind the knife Talal was left
in shock after Hamza informed him that this knife belonged to his great
grandfather Mashhour Al-Jazi, who was the command officer of a really important
battle in Jordan, which was between Israel and Jordan and Palestine’s combined
force. The war was called “Battle of Karameh”. And the knife Talal has was actually the knife Mashhour used in
that battle. Mashhour is a really loved and known figure by his country as he
did great things for it.
How Mashhour’s
accomplishments Inspired Talal
After Talal learnt all about Mashhour’s stories he got really inspired
by the world of War and national service, then kept doing all his research about
it. And his dream ever since was to join the Jordanian Military service. But unfortunately
due to family reasons a couple of years after that Talal had to move away from
his family alone to live with his friend in Jersey. But being his stubborn self
he didn’t change his mind about joining the national service and still worked
with what he had even if it cost him serving a country he wasn’t brought up in.
So he joined the Marine Cadets at the beginning where he was exposed to the
experience soldiers go through in the Navy, to give him a kind of sense of what
he was getting himself into.
Everything was going great for Talal apart from the racism he received at the cadet center due to his different ethnicity which confused him about whether he wants to go through that in the actually navy, because it’s a lot of years of commitment and there’s no going back.
Question : How do the photographers Walker Evans and Latoya Ruby Frazier portray the importance of family within their work?
Once used only to document information, photography has now flourished into a huge industry, being used for multiple different reasons – for self-expression, for awareness of current events, for political grounds. As once said, “From Daguerre’s age to ours, photography has undergone a transformation, not only technologically but conceptually.”(Bright and Van Erp. 2019:18) The ways to take and portray photos are endless, with each person having an independent reason as to why and how they could utilise photography. Many use this form of expression to focus it on the ones they value the most – family. Family has a significant impact in an individual’s life. They are the first people they are familiarised with in early childhood, they are the ones who make them feel comfortable and safe, and are usually the ones who help them get through when they find themselves stuck in a tough situation.
For my personal study, I will be focusing on the importance of family, specifically my own, and hope to portray them in a way which can express their importance to me. Family has always been important in my life. As mentioned before, they are the first people who we know in our lives, and this creates a special bond from early childhood which cannot be replicated with anyone else or destroyed. Most of my family, including my parents and younger brothers, currently live in London whereas I moved to live in Jersey with my aunt and uncle over a year ago. This evidently means that I don’t see and talk to them as much as I used to, but although we may not end up talking for a week or may not see each other for a few months, we still have that strong connection. This theme relates to the previous work I have been doing on Occupation and Liberation as families were affected during the war, especially those who had family members outside of Jersey and had trouble communicating with them while the island was occupied. We were able to take a look at the Red Cross letters which were sent between people trying to communicate with their loved ones, and were able to see the limited words exchanged between family which were separated.
Walker Evans, Cotton TenantsLatoya Ruby Frazier, The Notion of Family
The two photographers I am looking at are Walker Evans and Latoya Ruby Fraizer, two individuals who both documented family life. I decided that I would be investigating these artists as their works link to the theme which I am looking at. Although Walker Evans didn’t photograph his own family, he did take a look at others and the effect that the Great Depression had on these families. Latoya Ruby is a photographer who looked at her own family and effects that the state of the community had on them. These two photographers also relate to the work I have been doing previous to this, about the Occupation in Jersey, as their photographs revolve around the oppressed and struggling people in a place which wasn’t economically or socially strong at the time, with Walker Evans looking at families who were being effected by the Great Depression and Latoya Ruby looking at her own family within a community which was struggling with racism and economic downfall. To respond to these photographers’ works and my question I will be taking images of my own family from both London and Jersey and plan to edit them in the same black and white way which both Evans and Fraizer used for their images, so there won’t be much experimentation with colour but I will be focusing on factors such as contrast, cropping and under/over exposure. I will be aiming to take these images in a documentary style within the homes of my family members as this is when they are most themselves and the most authentic, which is an important factor of my photoshoot.
Since I am looking at family and hope to portray them and my relationship to them as they would be in their daily lives without any intentional manipulation, my work can be related to the movement of Realism. Realism was a creative movement which originated in France during the 1850s. Individuals who identified as realists rejected the ideas of Romanticism and revolted against the subject matter and overemphasized emotionalism of the movement. Realism in photography portrays things as they are without any abstract or idealised factors put into to change the image. People usually think of Realism within photography as the ‘truth’, since the images haven’t been edited or manipulated to change what is going on within it. However, this may not always be the case, as an image doesn’t need editing to be untruthful. As Giles Duley said, ‘ There is no truth in photography, only honesty’, which could mean that you never really know what the truth is when it comes to images that you haven’t taken yourself, since factors such as angles and camera lenses can change the real situation, so the only thing a photographer can do is be honest about their work.
1800’s Victorian family group portrait
Family pictures have been around for hundreds of years, with family photos becoming common around the time the camera was invented. Before the invention of the camera, middle to high class families were able to pay for expensive family portraits to be painted for them. Family has always been a main art subject, with individuals wanting to treasure their loved ones and their family legacy by having either a painting or a photo made of them. As cameras evolved and became more popular, photographers were able to find another way of documenting their families, by taking candid images of them within their lives. The subject of family is generally a topic which is related to Realism as many photographers prefer to capture their family relations as they are within their daily lives, with as little changes as possible. My work is the same, as I am planning to document my family from both London and Jersey and portray my relationship with them as they are normally, making my work related to Realism. I am looking at two photographers who both look at family, Walker Evans and Latoya Ruby Frazier, and both their work can link to Realism as they both document the lives of families and the effects of the economic downfalls that their families are facing.
Dorothea Lange, Migrant Mother
One photographer whose work is related to Realism is Dorothea Lange, a photographer who took images of farmers and migrant workers during the Great Depression and how this economic downfall affected these individuals. This image of the migrant mother and her children is one of Lange’s most famous images, and this is because it conveys a large amount emotions and stories just by looking at the mother’s facial expression. As a realist photographer, this image has not been altered or manipulated and is a clear idea of what was happening during the time of the Great Depression. Dorothea Lange is quite similar to the photographers I have chosen for my question, Latoya Ruby Frazier and Walker Evans. She looks at the oppression and suffering of people during an economic downfall, such as the Great Depression that both she and Walker Evans were looking at, and her work is documentary-like, showcasing the effects of these events.
When it comes to Realism, another photographer who fits into this movement is Walker Evans, a photographer who documented families during the Great Depression in America. Evans is one of the photographers who I am looking at for the theme of family, as he focused on families for most of his images. Walker Evans was a photographer who was best known for his work during the Great Depression, and how his documentary images brought light to the struggles of family life within small towns in America. Most of his images appear to be candid, although there are a few portraits here and there within his work. One of his prime influences was August Sander, a German portrait and documentary photographer, and has been described as the most important German portrait photographer of the early twentieth century.
August Sander, Circus PainterWalker Evans, Cotton Tenants
The image above is from his series Cotton Tenants, where he photographed three families in Hale County, Alabama, America. In this black and white image you can see a family of five and a dog standing on what looks likes a front porch. By the worn down clothes they are wearing and the poor state of the building they stand by, you can assume that they are a working class family and are struggling with poverty. You are immediately drawn to the man standing in the middle of the image, in front of the rest of his family. This may have been done on purpose to represent his importance to the family as the typical ‘bread-winner’, as during this era it was the husband who worked while the wife and children stayed at home.
The Great Depression was the worst economic downfall that has happened in American history. The stock market crash in October 1929 was the beginning of the Great Depression, and due to this by 1933 unemployment was at 25% and more than 5000 banks had gone out of business. The average family income during this time was $1,500, 40% less than what families usually earned before the start of the economic downfall, in turn leaving families stressed with just under half of their usual income gone. For his series ‘Cotton Tenants : Three Families’, Walker Evans photographed three families who were struggling with poverty to capture the effects of the Great Depression in Hale County, Alabama, and to expose the effects of this to the world. The people in the image above was one of the many families in that area who were facing destitution due to the economical decline during that era. At the time Evans photographed these three families, it was the height of the Great Depression and this was the time where people were finding it the hardest to cope. You can clearly see the effects it had on this family – they wouldn’t have been able to afford clean clothes, as portrayed by the rags they wore, nutritious food or the right equipment to fix and clean their house. However, I believe by having family during that time it made it easier for them to survive the depression, as although they were struggling with money and their basic needs, they’re still together on that porch.
The other photographer I am looking at for my question based on the importance of family is Latoya Ruby Frazier, a photographer who documented her own family during an economic downfall and a struggle of racism within her home down of Braddock, Pennsylvania. For her series ‘ The Notion of Family’, she looks at how these events within her town have effected her family within their home. There are two photographers who were large influences for her work – Carrie Mae Weems and Dawoud Bey. Carrie Mae Weems is considered to be “one of the most influential contemporary American artists”, and has investigated many factors through her works such as family, sexism, class, cultural identity, political systems and the consequences of power. When it comes to her influence on Frazier’s work, the topics which they both explore are quite similar, with Weems looking at cultural identity as one of her topics she has explored and Frazier looking at racism within her community. Frazier has also seemed to have taken on the same type of images which Weems has, such as candid images of others, and gone with the same use of black and white images which Weems has. Dawoud Bey is an American photographer who uses documentary style techniques to ” challenge stereotypical images of African Americans and other historically marginalized groups. “ Bey would have been an influence for Frazier as the topics which they both explore are similar to each other, with Bey looking at racism and stereotypes of African Americans and Fraizer looking at the racism within her community.
Dawoud Bey , A Man at Fulton Street and Cambridge Place, 1988, 30x40inchesCarrie Mae Weems, Kitchen Table seriesLatoya Ruby Frazier, The Notion of Family
In this image you can see two women sat on the floor in the middle of the black and white image. They both look at the camera with two different expressions, the older woman having a slight frown on her face while the younger woman looks a bit happier with a hint of a smile on her lips. They look like they’ve been interrupted from the middle of a conversation that they were having. They seem comfortable in each other’s presence, which indicated that they’ve known each other for a while and have a bond. The older woman looks to be the younger woman’s grandmother, as they both look similar to each other. The room they’re sitting in seems to be the living room, with the television and numerous other decorations, including the grandfather clock in the background. By the look of the room they don’t look like they’re struggling with money, but they don’t look like they are a middle or high class family either.
In Latoya Ruby’s series ‘ The Notion of Family’, she looks at the legacy of racism and economic decline in America’s small towns, through the use of her home town of Braddock, Pennsylvania which became financially depressed after the fall of the steel industry in the 1970s-1980’s. To look at these issues she focuses on three generations of her family – her grandmother, her mother and herself – and photographs them in their home. She follows the social documentary style of Walker Evans and Dorothea Lange to create images which were inspired by Gordon Parks, who promoted the camera as a weapon for social justice. Her images, including the one above, are raw photographs of her family and captures the authenticity of the moment. With the use of black and white images, she is able to highlight the beauty of her home town and how this place has affected her family’s life along with the other people who lived in the area. By taking images of her family still together and well within this difficult time, she is demonstrating the importance of having family through her work.
Both photographers include family – in Walker Evans’ image you can clearly see the family of five standing together on the porch, and in Latoya Ruby’s image you can see a grandmother and her granddaughter. When it comes to the contexts of their images, they are similar in the way in which they both look at the effect of economic downfall on families. Evans was exploring the effect of the Great Depression on families within small communities, while Ruby was looking at her own family in the time of racism and economic downfall in her home town of Braddock, Pennsylvania. They also show the importance of family in dire situations, with each of them photographing families which seem to have strong relationships in times which were socially and financially difficult for them. However it is different in the way which while Evans was looking at multiple families and how they were effected by a country-wide event, Ruby was only looking at the effects of economic downfall in her small hometown, and her own family. As Latoya Ruby was looking at her own family, she had more of a connection with those who she was photographing and knew them well, so she could shape her photographs to suit their personalities, lives, ect, whereas Walker Evans didn’t know the families personally and did not have that connection, so he may not have been able to take images which truly reflect who these people are. When it comes to each of them as individuals, there are differences between the two which could effect the way they take their images and look at the events which they are documenting, such as the fact that Frazier is a woman and Evans is a man, so they would each look at the events in different ways – through a man’s point of view and a woman’s point of view. By investigating these two artists they have inspired and influenced my work greatly by showing me ways of approaching my chosen theme of family, such as taking candid images of them within their own homes or out socialising. Latoya Ruby Frazier was able to portray the importance of family through the use of exploring her own family members and taking images of them during a time of financial downfall and racism within her community, and Walker Evans was able to show this by taking images of three families who were just pulling through during the Great Depression.
Bibliography:
Bright, S. and Van Erp, H.(2019), Photography Decoded. London: Octopus Publishing House
Parkin(2018), Realism and Honesty in Photography, www.onlandscape.co.uk (https://www.onlandscape.co.uk/2018/07/realism-and-honesty-in-photography/)
Carrie Mae Weems Biography, carriemaeweems.net( http://carriemaeweems.net/bio.html)
I needed to find a way to incorporate my essay in a visually appropriate and practical way, while not taking away from the main purpose of the book (the photos). In order to do this, I pasted the essay into Light-room, and from there I experimented with the placement of text, titles and photos that I would use to layout my essay and present it at the back of my book. My first draft of organizing and layout of the essay in my book was as below:
With this initial layout, I placed the essay in paragraphs, and tried to make sure each paragraph was written with a corresponding image on the page next to it, this way I could maintain the viewers attention, and give examples of the concepts and works that I was referencing in the essay. As my historical context paragraph was longer than the others, I gave that section of my essay a double page spread, and decided to include 2 images over the following 2 pages to present examples for the viewer to better understand the contents of the historical context portion of the essay. This double page of images also allows for a split in the essay after the 2 whole pages of text, therefore I find it important to add in order to split the essay into manageable chunks.
After placing my essay using the initial layout, I decided to restructure the layout so that it fit more flush with the pages, and the size was small enough to fit and work on the page, but large enough to be read without issue.
Firstly, I decided to keep the title at 12 pt, and move it into the middle of the page. I felt like this allowed for the title to stand out against the essay, and gave the reader a clear beginning to start reading. I differentiated from the title by placing the essay in 11 pt (a size large enough to read but small enough to fit on the page). Furthermore, I increased the padding from the left and right sides of the page to 26 pt, as I did not want the text to spill out into the gutter of the book (where the paper begins to bend over) as I felt that this would make it difficult to read.
I used the same 11 pt font and 26 pt padding across all of the pages with my essay on (to ensure continuity). I feel like this layout gives the essay pages more structure, and I am happy that the text does not come too close to the edges of the paper, or the gutter of the book.
Below is the final layout for the essay portion of my book:
When comparing between my first and second draft, I fee like my second layout has a lot more structure to it, and allows the reader to navigate the essay much more easily.
Above is an online display presentation of my final photo-book. ‘A Flight of Imagination’ is my photographic book surrounding the narratives of some of the folklore tales in Jersey, Channel Islands. Some of the tales date back hundreds of years and still showcase themselves in ways to the residents and tourists of this island in todays society. The book includes landscapes of the sights surrounding the stories as well as staged tableaux photographs which I went out and produced in order to tell these tales in a way in which showcased them still inhabiting the areas of the island. I split the photo-book in two, focusing on one tale in the beginning of the book and then moving forward to the next as I feel this made the most sense. I began each story with a starting image, heading off and leading into the story, the use of text in my book helped to elevate the stories most I feel, as the photographs need context to help make the narrative make sense so the best way I felt to do this was tell the story throughout the photo-book. For the first story I mainly focused on the landscape that surrounds the tale of Devil’s Hole, as it is something that brings a lot of locals and tourism to this specific point, now having a pub and cliff walk around the hole itself, I tried to create and include a small amount of tableaux photographs in this section however focused heavily on the landscape area. For the second story in my photo-book I mainly used and focused on the staged photographs, taking myself out and putting models in specific costumes to create these photographs, I wanted to tell a specific narrative with these photographs, the story specifically, although also using text to help add context to the photographs I focused on moving from character to character to create the story and narrative with minimal words. The use of the disposable camera in this section I feel adds a different touch to the photographs, they have a mystical hue around them which I feel works well with the subject of the story in telling it. I chose to have my impactful or important photographs larger and on double page or 3/4 page spreads as this makes them stand apart from the others. I decided to use some of the physical prints into the book to add a different effect to showcase the idea of these tales still being really in the island, to have them captured ‘on camera’ makes them seem more real and there I feel. I have ended my second story on a strip of negatives from the disposable camera to add a human, realistic touch, while displaying a subject which does not seem all that real. The essay, my personal investigation, found at the end of the photo-book, gives some context and insight to the lengths and extent that these images are influenced and derive from stories. I chose to place this at the back of my photo-book as I feel it helps to add some substance to my images more, it gives context into the idea of staged and tableaux photography and the idea of fact and fiction and where the lines are blurring of what separate individual people believe and how this also effects the outcome. This design has gone through many experimentation and trials to find the best way to produce and display the photographs, I believe I have successfully been able to produce what I aimed to of a book which displays the idea of stories and folklore tales occupying the island of Jersey, Channel Islands, I feel it has a clear narrative and I have been able to produce photographs that work well together and flow to clearing show meaning and narrative discussion.
How has children’s stories and literature influenced the work of Anna Gaskell and Julia Margaret Cameron?
“…these artists incorporated elements of fantasy, artifice and make-believe into their work.” (Bright . S, 2005 : 78)
Traditionally, throughout the 20th century photography was cantered around capturing the decisive moment, however, we have come to explore the notion of creating this ‘decisive moment’ artificially, constructing scenes made for only the purpose of photography. Tableaux photographs have been made from the beginning of the medium, although Staged Photography emerged as its own known genre in the 1980’s; both ideas involve composing a scene much like a painting, borrowing elements from Pictorialism. Anna Gaskell creates ominous photographs of women, taking themes from literature and children’s’ stories, generating a dream-like narrative in her work. I chose to look at Gaskell due to her staged and tableaux approaches and how she uses her influences to warp them into her own narratives and blurring the lines between fact and fiction. I am going to review the extent to which stories and literature has influenced her work using her imagery for Wonder (1996-97) influenced by Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland, and Hide(1998) influenced by Brother’s Grimm tale The Magic Donkey. In my own work I intent to explore the stories of the myths and folklore based in my home of Jersey, an island in the Channel Islands Archipelago. Using Gaskell as my influence to explore the notions of the boundaries of a narrative from a literary influence in the visual work and representations of female characters in children’s literature. I plan to explore the narratives with the legendary folktales using tableaux approach set in the real landscape of the island.
‘Hide’, Anna Gaskell
‘Untitled Film’, Cindy Sherman
Historical Context
The shift from photography being used to produce purely scientific and representational images happened from the 1850s onwards when advocates such as English painter William John Newton suggested that photography could also be artistic. Although initially originating in Britain, Pictorialism spread to be a worldwide movement in photography, seen as the first international art movement in photography. Despite it’s important role in photographic history according to David Bates, Pictorialism is still shown in negative terms due to ‘attracting little or no contemporary critical discussion’ (Bates. D, 2015 : 31), being dominated heavily by imagery of pious sentiment and romantic metaphor. Pictorialism requires time from the viewer due to its use of narrative as well as an understanding of the language of film and culture. In an chapter of ‘Art Photography Now’ this is described to be ‘the mise-en-scene and the dramatic lighting all borrow from the filmic tradition and share seductive qualities of the silver screen’ (Bright. S, 2005 : 78). Pictorialism began to rely heavily on narrative and like Bright discusses, share qualities and traits with the silver screen, some contemporary artists that used this idea is Cindy Sherman who took a post-modern approach in referencing specific cinematic tropes to generate parody and pastiche. Narrative photography, however, relies also on vital sources that veer away from cinema, such as painting, fashion, theatre and literature. Victorian photographer Julia Margaret Cameron referenced popular poems and literature in her photography in elaborate ‘tableaux vivants’, one example of this is Margaret Cameron’s Mountain Nymph Sweet Liberty, where an asserting model stares directly down the middle of the camera, due to this she is also looking directly towards the viewer as she fills the frame of the photograph, this image takes its title from John Milton’s poem L’Allegro, a celebration of life’s pleasures.
‘Mountain Nymph Sweet Liberty’, Julia Margaret Cameron
‘Untitled #47’, Wonder, Anna Gaskell
Anna Gaskell
Anna Gaskell is a contemporary American artist known for creating contemporary work exploring themes from literature and children’s stories. Gaskell creates ominous images of women that nod to familiar or historic narratives. She explains her process of an attempt “to combine fiction, fact, and my own personal mishmash of life into something new… “(Cascone.S 2017), Gaskell is creating imagery by merging together reality, fiction and her own personal touches of the two warping and blurring the lines between the well-known stories and her own interpretation on them. Creating photographs that depict narratives from literature, Gaskell takes her influences and translates them into her own, stretching the boundaries of the narrative of the stories and literature that has influenced her work. Gaskell’s work dips into the tradition of Pictorialism, using tableaux methods to generate her photographs. Gaskell’s photo series “Wonder” is influenced off Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland, the work is produced off the back of the idea of isolating dramatic moments from the larger plots. The photographs are staged and planned in the style of ‘narrative photography’, the scenes are artificial, produced and only exist to be photographed.
‘Hide, Anna Gaskell
‘Hide’, Anna Gaskell
I have chosen to look closer at ‘Untitled #47’ from Anna Gaskell’s series Wonder, the photograph depicts two young girls both dressed identically interacting with each other with a sense of urgency, one towering over the other holding their neck and nose. Although interacting with each other they do not represent individuals, but instead, act out the contradictions and desires of a single psyche, Gaskell’s use of twins for the representation of Alice builds a connection and visual link of identicalness for in which we know they are being represented together rather than individually, while their unity is represented by their identical clothing and looks. Gaskell has staged the photographs to create her own striking visual reinterpretation of Wonderland through the moments of Alice’s physical transformation, the mysterious and often cruel rituals they act out upon each other may be metaphors for disorientation and mental illness. Gaskell’s work has no clear beginning or end containing ambiguous narratives, adding to the emphasis of the unknown and disorientation. This idea is striking in comparison to Alice in Wonderland as the narrative can be originally taken as Alice’s own dreams taken from stories, the character collectively evoked is Alice, perhaps lost in the Wonderland of her own mind, unable to determine whether the bizarre things happening to her are real or the result of her imagination. Gaskell has created a alternative narrative one in which the audience is familiar with, generating a post-modern effect of a simulacra to entice her audience.
In comparison to her series Wonder it is clear Gaskell has been influenced by other stories and pieces of literature which is clear to see in her later series Hide based off Brothers’ Grimm tale The Magic Donkey, this series has been suggested to be her most radical and abstract to date, the title of the series can be linked in reference to the children’s game ‘hide and seek’. In this series Gaskell has again cast young girls as her forefront protagonists, placing them in photographs that emit a sense of nightmarish foreboding and thinly veiled violence. Gaskell’s reference to the Brother’s Grimm story is brought out in the sense of anxiety that she creates with the dramatic lighting and camera angles.
‘Wonder’, Anna Gaskell
‘Im Garten’, Julia Margaret Cameron
Anna Gaskell and Margaret Cameron both have been inspired by that of Lewis Carroll, equally from his literature and his photography. With almost over 100 years difference between the two photographs they have contrasting ways in which they use staged Pictorialism photography. Gaskell has taken on the darker side of the literary influences, taking a high contrast, menacing point of view in her photographs, whereas Cameron’s photographs are lighter and less intense, the figures in Cameron’s imagery show a sweet and kind aura compared to the sinister persona’s depicted in Gaskell’s imagery. Fairy-tales can often be gruesome, Brother’s Grimm tales were never often sweet and innocent, but rather threatening and perverse, Gaskell has explored this side of fairy-tales in her work rather than a ‘cinematic’ ending. Films and cinema commonly end on a high, Cameron’s work could be seen as taking this pleasant side of literature into account in her photography.
In my own work I explored tableaux techniques as responses to the folklore of Jersey. Using the landscapes of the island where the stories are set I planned my photoshoots to include stage tableaux photographs as well as landscape imagery to represent the legends. While planning my shoots I researched the individual stories, using the documentation, The Channel Island: Les Petits Faîtchieaux, I was able to develop the fairytales of Jersey. The fairies are strongly associated with prehistoric sights; MacCulloch, art historian and academic, notes it was best believed that the fairies inhibited the island before the people who are here now and ‘that the cromlechs were erected by them for dwelling places’ (MacCulloch : 2). It is said people who interfered with the ancient sights would be punished by the fairies. One tale tells of Mr Hocart who broke up the ancient One tale tells of Mr Hocart who broke up the ancient stones of La Roque Qui Sonne for building material who soon after became cursed. Tales are also told of men being blinded by the fairies for disrupting the lands and sights. From tales like this I began to take a cinematic approach to my photographs, having my models staging the tales in chronological order of a story, adding a narrative to the photographs. I edited my photographs so that the colours were enhanced and higher contrast. I did this to add to the other-worldly type effect to enhance the idea of these being folklore and alienated from reality.
‘Beatrice’, Julia Margaret Cameron
‘Wonder’, Anna Gaskell
My own work has similar attributes to Anna Gaskell’s work and slightly contrast with that of Margaret Cameron’s. I have also chosen to take on a slightly darker side of the fairy-tale with looking at the side of the story that includes curses and the act of blinding. This links to Gaskell’s work which also takes on a darker approach to stories, as well as using the cinematic style of mid-action (photographs compared to Cameron’s images which generally showcase still, gentle figures.) Taking the idea of stillness, I also produced portraits of my models surrounded with a sense of tranquility. I felt this added effect to my narratives to have them posed still and silent juxtaposing my other images. I have connected more to Gaskell’s work with creating a sinister sense of suspense through my photographs with the use of cinematic shots as well as the angles and mise-en-scene I have used.
To conclude, literature has had a large effect on Anna Gaskell as well as Julia Margaret Cameron which has in turn influenced me. Both photographers have taken on two different approaches to interpreting children’s stories and literature, while staying connected by taking on conventions of Pictorialism using tableaux staged photography. Gaskell takes the approach of the darker, more menacing approach, with Cameron representing the lighter, softer side of the stories. Both represent and visually show their influences from literature but in two different ways. In my own work I have also used staged photographs, mixing in the menacing side of the Jersey folklore with the bright high contrast colours adding an alienation to the photographs in order to separate them from the daily life that rests in the landscapes today.
Here I have my final layouts for the print work I produced at the end of the personal investigation in relation to Occupation and Liberation. I chose and finalised on the specific layouts I did as I feel they all enhance and showcase the work well. Choosing to single out one large photograph against the black I feel works well with the particular image due to the colours and the forms in the image works well by itself as I do not have many like it. For my other photographs I chose them together as they work well in a sequence, telling a narrative together to create a larger picture to take from.
