THEMES-

Over the course of the various Love and Rebellion projects I explored several different themes, including:

• home
• family
• self-love, self acceptance
• platonic vs romantic love
• youth/adolescence
• isolation + loneliness
• anti-art

I also did a lot of research on the subthemes of racism and colonialism; how they came about, historical events that were caused or affected by them, how they impacted Jersey, and the Black Lives Matter movement.

MEDIUM-

• still photography
• film/moving images

I used still photography for my photo zine and in some parts of my film project, however the majority of my film is made up of moving images. I preferred using moving images for the film because I felt it made it more dynamic and engaging, however I do also generally like still photography for the rest of my projects.

APPROACHES-

I tried to use a variety of approaches, including:

• candid
• environmental
• portrait
• documentary
• monochrome
• colour

I think using different approaches through different projects is beneficial because it allows you as a photographer to develop your own persona; style as well as develop your skills. I used a candid and documentary-style approach in my photo zine in order to fit with the theme of “capturing moments in time”, which worked very well in my opinion. I’ve experimented with either monochrome or colour in all of the projects in “Love and Rebellion”, and decided on which way to go depending on the theme/subject, the artists I was inspired by, as well as how good it looked visually.

ARTISTS-

I studied many different artists, not all of them photographers but all of them using a variety of different styles and approaches.

• Claude Cahun- French photographer who took mainly self-portraits revolving around her gender identity/self-expression; she was a pioneer in the Surrealist art movement and a resistance fighter during the Nazi occupation of Jersey
• Alec Soth- American portrait photographer, does lots of environmental photographs of people from different backgrounds; contemporary work, often colourful, bright and natural
• Laia Abril- documented the after-effects of death within a family, themes of grief, eating-disorders, recovery and family; published in a photobook called “The Epilogue”
• Shannon O’Donnell- contemporary photographer focusing on gender roles/identity, questioning authority figures; often uses film/moving images as a medium
• Carrie Mae Weems- American photographer focused on the “human experience” as well as issues facing black people in society and her own struggle with personal identity
• Banksy- world-famous anonymous street artist, often his work is very political and rebellious and uses a very distinctive stenciling technique

SKILLS-

I also learnt how to use a few new pieces of software:

• Adobe Premiere Pro
• Adobe Lightroom
• Adobe InDesign

In my film, I use Premiere Pro as well as Lightroom to edit the footage and put it all together. For my zine I made good use of Lightroom to select the right images and edit them, then put the actual zine together on InDesign.

Additionally, I improved my Photoshop skills by using it throughout all of my projects.

PAST PROJECTS-

Overall I have two final products on the theme of “Love and Rebellion” : a short film and a photo-zine.

The photo-zine came from the prompt title “A Love Story” and focuses on the sub-themes of youth, friendship, home and family. I was inspired by a past student’s work as well as the photographer Laia Abril. The images are mainly unplanned and candid, with a few staged portraits, mixing between images of individuals and group photos. My intention was to represent how close-knit young friendship groups can be and present a fairly ambiguous story of platonic love, as well as document my own friends and my youth. Specific aspects of this project I enjoyed and want to continue using is the candid style of the images, as well as the generic themes of youth and non-romantic love, because I feel like romantic love is used very often in photography and non-romantic forms of love can be so much more interesting and original.

The second project I worked on in “Love and Rebellion” was a 90-ish second film that I made with a group, called “Some Sunny Day”. Our starting themes were anti-art, risk and the absurd, which we linked to the island’s covid-19 lockdown, young people’s response to it, along with Jersey’s historic occupation during the Second World War. We filmed all of the footage in a trip to an isolated bunker left over from the Occupation and incorporated a quote from a popular war song of the era, “We’ll Meet Again” by Vera Lynn (which is where the title comes from). Another key part of the film was our soundscape which was mainly made up of a homemade recording of a radio announcement made in early March explaining the first lockdown. We are all quite pleased with the end-result, and I particularly like how the medium of a film allowed us to incorporate sound and more emotion, as well as making a clearer narrative, which is why I think I am going to make another short film for my Personal Study.