lauren greenfield was a documentary photographer and filmmaker who explores the themes of self-esteem, lifestyles of teenagers, power of money and fame and plutocracy. in her project, girl culture, she photographed girls to “explore girls’ relationships to their bodies and the ways in which they use body projects to establish their identities.”. the photographs themselves were taken to investigate modern femininity. in, girl culture, she reveals the insecurities of the girls she is photographing by adding snippets of statements they have said relating to self-esteem. lauren greenfield describes herself as being interested in “sociological issues” and with each photograph she aims to” speak for the culture we live in.”. an article described greenfields topics as “very identifiable and relatable”, even though the photos were taken way before the author were born.
The colours in this image are bright and garish and relate to childhood, in the sense that children like to dress up in vivid colours. This links to greenfields subject matter in the sense that she is taking essentially taking pictures of young girls, however they feel they should act older to be liked. Overall the composition of the image is strong and the girls in the background frame the girl in the foreground, that greenfield has decided to focus more on. The question is why is this girl the focus of the image? is she in any way different to the others? On the face of it she looks the same, just a girl in her swimming costume? But maybe she has more insecurties than the rest? Or maybe she is fearless, unlike the rest? This aspect is under the interpretation of the viewer. In ‘girl culture’ lauren greenfield aimed to explore girls relationships with their bodies and this image shows just this. On observation you can see that some of the girls are wearing shorts over their swimming costumes, this connotates to a bad relationship with their body. However these girls look no older than 12, and this image creates the question of why the girls feel self conscious? Has society molded their brain into thinking this?
| what? | portraits self portraits |
| who? | sister- in her gym kit myself- in my show gear |
| where? | at the gym at the yard |
| how? | camera on a tripod |
| why? | to show how society has made us dress a certain way in order to feel better about ourselves |