Incorporating the idea of experimentation, I wanted to show the items that the adolescents may use, but avoiding documentation of them using it. Some things I’m aiming to photograph are:
Alcoholicbottles and cans, which will show the obvious experimentation youth do with alcohol.
Drug paraphernalia and Pills. Adolescents can often be seen trying to achieve altered mind states as they are not aware of the full risks or have a sense of immortality. They often feel that the risks behind illegal drug use apply to everyone else but not to themselves. Rolled currency notes have connotations of being used for drug use and so I may incorporate this into the shoot.
Tobacco, Skins and Filters. Much of today’s youth are renowned for smoking and so I’ve considered showcasing the use of tobacco in my project. Additionally photographing smoking skins and filters will further develop this.
Vape devices. Vaping is a fairly new and inventive way to consume nicotine, first emerging in 2003 and becoming popularised around 2014. Because of this, the devices are highly applicable to the youth today. The development of nicotine-salts created new addictions in both smoking and non-smoking teens. Especially after the invention of flavoured Juuls. Vapes are no longer seen or used to cure nicotine addiction, but as a ‘healthier’ way to create new ones.
Where am I photographing this?
I plan to carry out this photo-shoot at home. In order to achieve the effect I want, I’m aiming to create a home-made studio.
By using black card to create an infinity curve, I will be able to achieve an ‘invisible background’, resulting in my props becoming the only visible part of the image, and therefore the main focus.
How am I photographing this?
Having set up the personal studio, I plan to use natural light to highlight the props. I planed to use the infinity curve I created below to photograph my objects. However, a lot of my objects are dark, so I am experimenting with white and coloured paper to see the different outcomes
Setting up the infinity curve beside a large window where natural light can flood through.
using foil to reflect the light on the other side of the object.
Images:
Shoot: Black infinity curve
Edited images:
To edit these images, I used the editing software in both Lightroom and Photoshop. I started by editing the images in my catalog, decreasing the exposure where necessary and increasing the saturation of black in the photos. This allowed for an even black background, so that the objects would become isolated. For the images that still needed further work to reach this stage, I transferred them into photoshop and used both the pipette and the brush tool to get the desired background
in what way is identity and autobiography expressed in the work of cindy sherman and jen davis?
“I am trying to make other people recognize something of themselves rather than me.”
Both this essay and my creative project is all about documenting, whether it be how I feel about myself and how my chosen photographers, Jen Davis and Cindy Sherman, reflect on their own personal experiences, both emotional and physical. The essay is going to delve into how both the photographers explore their identity and autobiography in their photographic work. My creative project will include self-portraits, landscapes, portraits and objects, to hopefully portray things about myself and my life. Jen Davis work shows a journey of self-discovery and portrays her feelings toward her looks. Our subject matters don’t align specifically, but there are some similarities, such as we both have taken self-portraits that show how we feel about ourselves. Cindy Sherman’s work is mainly role play, challenging gender stereotypes ; she dresses up as different types of people and poses for the camera, with a nod to cinematic scene portrayal. This is a kind of tableau, with carefully chosen locations, backdrops and props. However in an article she does explain that she does sometimes see herself in her images.
The photographers that I am studying in detail, Jen Davis and Cindy Sherman, both explore identity and autobiography in their work, however they both use different genres of photography to do this. Cindy Sherman’s work relates to the post-modernism genre, as she doesn’t hide where she gets her inspiration for her work from but instead, she genuinely mocks it. All of her images have a ridiculing element to them, whether it maybe through her makeup, clothing or ridiculous props that are featured in her images. Her images literally poke fun at what society expects women to look like. The post-modernism genre was first seen in the 20th century, when architects criticised the style of the modernist architecture for being too formal, austere and functional. Post-modernist photographers, including Barbara Kruger, Corrine Day and Hannah Starkey, use their work to build on the themes and conceptual ideas that began during the modernist period.
Hannah Starkey
Corrine Day
Barbara Kruger
A quote I found (Susan Bright (2010) Autofocus) aligns directly with what Sherman wanted to do with her photography, “postmodern thinking led to a radical shift in the way that the body was presented and understood”, in the sense that her work has changed how viewers look at the female body. Jen Davis work relates to realism, even though her images are reconstructed, she hopes to document her own issues with her body and relationships and intimate fantasies with men. Realism came about in the 1940’s and aimed to provide an accurate representation of the real world, real problems, real life. The images, relating to realism were made to look more like photographs than art and were a reaction to pictorialism. Artists that are known in the realism genre, are Paul Strand, Dorothea Lange and Jacob Riis. I found a quote (Susan Bright (2010) Autofocus)that relates to Jen Davis photography work, “photographers have produced large bodies of work consisting of frank and intimate portraits and self-portraits that explore the gritty, bohemian lives of those around them and act as important documentation of the times they capture”, in the sense that the images that Jen Davis took over the span of 11 years investigated many aspects of her life, that wouldn’t have probably been explored without this project.
Jen Davis investigates identity and autobiography in her photographic project, Eleven Years, where she produced a large amount of beautiful self-portraits, using natural light and strong compositions, over the span of 11 years. In the project Davis images portray the ideas beauty, sense of identity and her struggles with her body image. In an article on (clampart (2014) https://clampart.com/2014/04/eleven-years/#thumbnails)Jen Davis describes the idea of ‘Eleven Years’ was to ” invite the viewer into the past eleven years of my private life, exploring the vulnerabilities… body, feelings of isolation, the battle to recognise beauty, a quest for intimacy, and sense of acceptance through the camera’s eye”. To me ‘Eleven Years’ does just that, it does allow the viewer to understand who Jen Davis really is, what she internally struggles with, and tells a story of her journey of change. As you flick through the photo book that she produced, her story starts to unravel before your eyes and it is clear that the person in the photo in the first image is not the same in the last image, but a different, more established version of Jen Davis. Davis cleverly describes how she personally feels about beauty and what she has captured within her images, “I couldn’t necessarily identify with the idea of someone seeing me as ‘beautiful,’ but I could accept that the pictures that I created and inhabited were.” clampart (2014) https://clampart.com/2014/04/eleven-years/#thumbnails) Essentially what Davis feels is that she cannot be beautiful but the images that she took were, is that because she could carefully compose them and enhance things that real life shows? Or was it because she felt she could truly be herself in front of camera? Why didn’t she feel beautiful?
Jen Davis – Untitled
This image is may relate to the way Davis feels about herself and lack of self-confidence. The light in this image is natural, which seeps through a gap and allows some light to shine on the face, illuminating the features. This aspect is truly beautiful and idyllic. Jen Davis employs compositional and lighting techniques that are reminiscent of The Dutch Masters. The Dutch Masters used and painted light in a very clever way, by featuring windows in their paintings. By adding these elements they illuminated the main element of the image. Jen Davis has done this multiple times throughout her book, projecting light onto herself. Did she do this to illuminate other things? To illuminate how the way she feels about herself contrasts with the way society views her.
Johannes Vermeer – The Milkmaid
A question that is created by this image is one of, what is she thinking about? What is running through her mind during this image was being taken? Is she thinking about how she feels about herself? Is she reflecting on how she felt during a part of her life? This aspect is unknown to the viewer but is what makes the image so powerful. This aspect is under the interpretation of the viewer and the viewer only. During my creative process I have taken many self-portraits and struggled to look back at them. It’s an interesting and weird feeling seeing yourself as if you were one of your friends looking at you. The criticism I felt towards myself was shocking. In an article (Diana Spechler (2012) https://www.oprah.com/health/jen-davis-self-portraits-weight-loss-and-photography/all), Jen Davis describes how she felt during her creative process, “It was like I was taking self-portraits,” she says, “except I wasn’t in them.”, it’s fascinating to think how Davis and myself feel so detached from the portraits of our own self, even though it is clearly us, as we know what we look like. Maybe it’s because we have our own perspective of ourselves and so does everyone else, but the self-portraits show us how we are seen in the world, reality. This quote from Davis creates the interesting question of does she lack identity? Or does she just lack the confidence to see herself within an image she took. Jen Davis work relates clearly to autobiography, not just because she tells her own story but because she investigates real and unconventional struggles of the life she lives.
Cindy Sherman cleverly investigates identity and autobiography in her work, which consists of hundreds of self-portraits where she dresses up in different outfits, puts strange make up and wears extravagant wigs, to alter her person to become a different one to portray different characters and story lines. These portrays explore identity and gender, and were made to intentionally mock how society expects women to dress, act and be. In the project, Complete Untitled Film Stills, where she created film-like stills by dressing up as different characters from mid-20th-century B movies and photographed herself in various locations. These images quickly became very popular and were used to spark up conversations on feminism, postmodernism and representation. In an article, Sherman described how she felt during her childhood. She was the youngest child and felt, in order to gain the attention of her family she would have to be different, and she achieved this by dressing up and changing her appearance. She made a clever statement in the article which I feel explains her intentions of all of her projects, “if you don’t like me this way, how do you like me this way?”. On the surface her images may not seem like they are about herself, but maybe if you look deeper, they are, maybe she enjoys changing her appearance, identity, herself entirely, even it is just for a photograph, for a split second. Is dressing up a part of an act of escapism for Sherman, but the question is what, what is she escaping?
Cindy Sherman – Untitled
The colours that are incorporated in this image are garish and bright, and don’t really complement each other, but clash. The background is almost over powering of the face within the image, was this the purpose? It brings about the question of what relevance does it have to the face that Sherman has portrayed. The lines within the background lead the viewers eye towards the face in the image. Overall, this image has a high level of composition. Who is Cindy Sherman trying to be here? Someone who likes to look pretty and glamorous? However, she seems to be mocking them, as the makeup is over the top and excessive. So, does she pretend to be different people to almost try and gain attention from people to make up for the lack of recognition from her family. During her childhood Sherman was obsessed with her appearance, and enjoyed to wear makeup, so does this image relate to her past self, and maybe she is mocking who she was? Her film stills were left untitled, and a critique to her work stated (Simon Hattenstone (2011), me, myself and i, https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2011/jan/15/cindy-sherman-interview), “All the photos are untitled – another way of distancing herself from the images.” But why did she want to do this? Was it because secretly the images were about herself and did depict who she really was? In another article, Sherman describes how she feels now about her own photographs, “I am a little more comfortable now in letting parts of myself show through.”, does this now mean that she is part of the photographs and they are intentionally about her, or still does she still have a detachment from them and herself within them. A quote from an article describes exactly how I feel about Shermans work, “through the use of their bodies, artists constantly question what it means to be human”.
Although this project is solely inspired by Jen Davis and Cindy Sherman, I have explored some differences during the progression of my project. All of our work is based on identity ;who we are and who we are not, who we strive to be and our internal monologue/autobiography. However, my work has become very abstract and some of the images are centred around things I love. The work I have produced have abstract meanings and when some people look at what I done may not understand what I am trying to portray and to be honest some of the things don’t even really make sense to myself. Like what is life, what is love, what is rebellion? Where does love come from? Why do we rebel? How have I rebelled, or have even I rebelled at all? My work itself is an act of rebellion. By taking pictures of things of I shouldn’t and when I shouldn’t, I have essentially rebelled. My work is also an act of love. By taking pictures in order to learn more about myself, and to document things, places, feelings and people I love. The similarities between mine and Cindy Shermans work is that by taking self-portraits we have explored who we are, and use make up to explore ourselves. After an in-depth study of Cindy Shermans work it is apparent that her images are made to show different characters and not herself. The differences between mine and Cindy Shermans work is that she intends to change her identity by dressing up and looking different. Does she dress up as people she wants to be and regrets not being? Her whole project is solely self-portraits that portray and mock societies views on women and how they should look, act and what they should become. We have seen this in the earlier work of Claude Cahun too ; body image, gender roles and stereotypes are pushed and pulled around. The viewer is left to make concious decisions about what it is they are seeing. The similarities between mine and Jen Davis work is that by taking self-portraits we have explored the idea of beauty, both within ourselves and others, and learnt things about ourselves. The differences between mine and Jen Davis work is the solely took self-portraits and looked in detail into her fantasies and how she yearns for intimacy. Over the span of 11 years Davis explored the relationships she had had and included many of them in her work. Overall, the photographers that I have studied have inspired my creative processes but have also allowed myself to explore different ideas too.
I created this photobook in an attempt to demonstrate the experiences and struggles that a teenage boy faces when passing through to adulthood. This is the final layout for my photobook. I have began and ended the book with black and white images as a way of showing that the experiences and thoughts of many teenage boys are trapped within them selves. Other than these two images, the rest of the book is very vivid and bright creating an almost psychedelic colour scheme. My original plan was to create the book in black and white to amplify the deep emotion I have attempted to portray. However, upon inspection of my first photoshoot I decided that the images would be a lot more powerful in heavily saturated colour. This creates frantic images with a lot to look at and emphasises the bestrewed mind of the teenage boy. The use of the multi-protagonist effect in my ages definitely proved to be the biggest obstacle. I believe if I had known how challenging this process would be, I could have planned more photoshoots and allowed my self more time for editing, so that my book could have consisted of more images. The sequence its self is split into three distinct portions. The first three images are highly saturated pictures all consisting of their own metaphorical meaning in relation to the teenage mind. The subsequent six images come in pairs, I have compared the three photos of Charlie with the objects ‘hidden in plain sight’ within the photos. I emphasised the Alcohol, cigarettes and poker to show these ‘taboo’ objects and how they are so simply and easily introduced into the life of a young teenager. I chose to show the closeups of the images before the photo they are compared with as an attempt to foreshadow what was to come. I believe this was the main meaning of my photobook followed by the effect this has on an individuals mind and their love towards themselves. This is seen in my final three images where I present Charlies reflection in a mirror not representing him properly. I did this to heighten the idea that he is disconnected from himself and not only does he not recognise the person he sees in the mirror but they are two completely different people. Overall I am happy with the outcome of my photobook, although it did not go exactly to plan, I believe that I still managed to convey meaning and a narrative in the way that I wanted to.
In order to make this image appear as if it is in complete darkness I increased the contrast and decreased the brightness on photoshop and then adjusted the whites & blacks in Lightroom. I used a computer screen to hold the image to create the reflection and I coloured out parts of the computer using the clone stamp tool to create complete darkness.
I took this photo with a Go-Pro attached to a beam in the ceiling. I has to rotate the image in order to make it more symmetrical and I then had to readjust the colour, clarity and contrast in order to make the image look more like my other two final pieces from this shoot.
This is the final photo in my sequence, so I made it B&W to amplify the emotional effect of this reflection of charlie. I kept the mirror reflection yet I removed charlie from the image to emphasise a sense of disconnection from himself.
For this image I have increased the saturation to greatly increase the vibrant colours within the photo. I was aiming to create a sense of joyfulness in this picture as it is the only photo that I believe holds a connection between childhood and young adulthood in relation to my subject.
I wanted to compare these two images side by side as I am trying to draw emphasis to the unhealthy habits that form due to peer pressure and ‘lad culture’, however I also wanted all my images to have a full bleed across the entire page so they can be viewed in as much detail as possible.
I started creating my front cover. I wanted the image to be very abstract, and create questions for the viewer as to what the book was going to portray. I have named the book ‘5:15’ because that is the time I wake up everyday and the images that are included in my book essentially illustrate what shows what I do during my waking hours, how I feel and who I am. image 1 and 3 shows my first layout for the cover, I personally didn’t feel the placement worked and didn’t want the title and my name to be separated.image 2 and 4 shows another layout that I liked, where the title and name was placed together. I felt this worked better. I knew when I started the planning process of my book I wanted the quote “id rather walk alone” on the front cover. image 5 and 6 shows my processes of working out the placement of this quote. I felt it needed to be diagonally placed from the title and my name, as this aesthetically looks very neat. I felt that in image 6 the quote was placed incorrectly and it was too hard to read it on the white parts of the strongly contrasted image. image 5 was the final cover
I then wanted my first page to have the same image as my front cover but slightly faded. I did this by adjusting it in photoshop. I then used the same placement of the title and my name as the front cover on this page.
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image 1 shows my first placement of the image. I found it was too big and overwhelming on the page. image 2 was the image slightly smaller, but I found that it still wasn’t the perfect size and needed more of a surrounding space around it. image 3 is the perfect size of the image and meant that it wasn’t too overpowering on the page.
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all of these images are very similar and are placed periodically throughout the book to separate the narrative up.
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image 1 shows one way I placed these 2 images, I felt this way worked best because the compositions of both images looked nice like this. image 2 shows another way I could have placed them, but I felt this didn’t really work as image on the left looks odd there, as the image just ends there.
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image 1 shows the image just placed on the left page, I felt this looked odd and didn’t look aesthetically pleasing. image 2 showed the image placed more to the left, and slightly larger. This placement is not great because the face is placed directly on the centre of the double page spread. image 3 is the image placed to the right of the book. I find this looks good because the centre line of the double page spread is in a place that works for the images and almost separates the image into 2 images entirely, however but line sits on the face reflected in an odd place and I don’t like this. image 4 shows the image placed slap bang in the centre of the double page spread and works similarly to image 3, in the sense that it separates the image into 2 images. the significance of this aspect is important because it show disassociation and how the two figures, both real and reflected are two separate entities.
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image 1, 2 and 3 show the development of this spread. I found that image 3looks the best because it is full of colour and in the book the few previous images have been predominantly black and white. The change to the colour left the book feeling fresh and not too samey.
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image 1 shows the first arrangement of a spread that contained two very abstract images. I found this spread was not very correct and lacked aesthetically aspects. image 2 shows an alternative arrangement, however I feel it still didn’t look great, as the light was coming from the same place. image 3 shows how I changed the orientation of the image and makes the overall spread looks better and more succinct.
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image 1 and 4 show 2 different ways I could have presented this image in the centre of the page, I preferred it on the right as I liked the writing on the bottom righthand side as it looked aesthetically pleasing. image 2 and 3 shows 2 different ways I could have presented the image as a full page. I didn’t really like this as it was too full on and needed some white space around.
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image 1 shows the placement of these 2 images. I didn’t feel it looked great this way because the centre line of the double page spread cut through the portrait and ruined the aesthetics of the page. image 2 shows an alternative arrangement of the 2 images. this arrangement works best because the centre page line sits better on the portrait.
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image 1 shows a potential placement of 3 images. I feel this doesn’t look great as the single portrait sits unbalanced and doesn’t really look great next to the other 2 images. image 2 shows an alternative arrangement which to me looks the best and the foregrounds of the two images on the left sit nicely on the centre line of the double spread. image 3 shows a different arrangement of the two images on one side of the page. I found this arrangement looked off because the figures in the foreground didn’t flow from one to another.
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image 1 shows a spread of 2 images. I felt these images didn’t work great together because they are both very similar in colour and dont complement each other. image 2 shows another potential spread, however like the image 1 doesn’t really work either, as the are both very busy. this spread did make me realise that the 1 of the 2 image needed to be black and white to create a contrast between the 2. image 3 shows a spread that contained an image with words. I felt this didn’t really work either, as the words were distracting and took the focus away from the colourful image to the left of it. image 4 shows the chosen spread. I used this black and white image with the colourful image because 1 was full of movement and the other 1 was still and juxtaposed nicely.
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image 1 shows the image that I used in my first draft of the book, however I felt it lacks interest, was too simple and also didn’t really relate to the narrative of my book. image 2 was of a photo that I really liked but like image 1 didn’t really relate to the narrative of my book either. image 3 included an image that was similar to another and I didn’t want the book to be too samey so it was rejected. image 4 shows a full bleed of an image that is similar to the photograph in image 1 but has a much more clearer and purpose for the book. I chose a full bleed for this image because I found it was an important image for the narrative, and represented speed, time and travel.
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I had used this image in the first draft of my book but it had a piece of text in the bottom righthand corner and I felt this was distracting and didn’t help with the minimalistic, clean and sleek feel I was going for with the book. image 1 shows the image with a different orientation and without the piece of text. on reflection I felt the image lacked interest so decided to reedit the image and increase the saturation to brighten up the streaks of light. I also cropped and flipped it too as there was too much negative black space within the image and which left the streaks of light being the smaller element of the piece, whereas I wanted it to be the larger element of the piece. image 3 was the final version of the photograph and placement in the photo book.
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image 1 shows the original image that I used for this spread. I felt that the text that was placed on the picture was distracting. However on reflection I felt that I didn’t really like the image after all. Personally I wished it was all in focus and that elements weren’t blurry. image 2 shows a potential image that I chose to replace the other one, however I felt the colours were too bright and didn’t flow with the ones before it, so I decided to chose a black and white image instead. image 3 shows a different image that I liked. I placed the it to the left as I didn’t want the centre line of the double page spread to cut across the image as it would then lower the aesthetic level of the spread. image 4 shows another potential photo to use, however I felt that it was framed badly in the photographic process and the face was too zoomed up and would have looked better with more of a background.
when planning the book I had decided that I wanted the book to have some personal elements but wasn’t sure of how I was going to execute this. after some thought I decided to hand write the title, my name and the quote for the front page and the first page too. I did this by using the brush tool on photoshop on transparent page, writing whatever needed to be written. I kept the same placement of the title, my name and quotes as before as it worked well.
light red
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I found that the red was too bright on the more faded background on the first image, so I tried 2 different colour : a lighter red and black. I felt that the black looked the best as the lighter red sort of blended into the background and was harder to read.
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after reviewing the book I found that it had lots of white pages which was honestly very boring so I decided to make the key pages with the similar images have a bright colour in the background. This also helped separate the book up into sections, and split up the narrative better. I also added quotes from my personal journal and found words. I did these in my handwriting too, to add to the personal elements I wanted to include in my book. When first editing my images I did have some photos with quotes on, but I did find that they distracted from the original intent of the image, so when this idea came about I thought it was the perfect way to include my own words from journal and found words that I like.
Throughout the project I have taken some images, however they are on film and didn’t want to add them in digitally but physically. after the book has been printed I am going to add them in.
As Robert Mapplethorpe himself quoted; “I am obsessed with beauty. I want everything to be perfect, and of course it isn’t. And that’s a tough place to be because you’re never satisfied”. I share the same desire for perfection in my own appearance, both mentally and physically. This need for perfection comes as a sort of validation, a purpose in my eyes hence why in my personal investigation, my area of study will look at masculinity, what it means to be male, more specifically looking at how adolescence shapes us as men, conflicts men often face such as body dysmorphoria and a desire to fulfil a certain mould, a mould set by society to look and act a certain way, to be the breadwinner and the hero they dreamt of being as a child. The aim is to show that you should love yourself, even if your mind wants to rebel against that. To achieve this, I will be studying both the works of Robert Mapplethorpe and Karlheinz Weinberger as well as analysing their works on male photography and the male gaze, and how lad culture is ever present in their photography.
‘Lad culture’ according to Wikipedia is a “British and Irish subculture initially associated with the Britpop movement. Arising in the early 1990s, the image of the “lad”—or “new lad”—was that of a generally middle class figure espousing attitudes typically attributed to the working classes”. This is a commonly captured stereotype, often linked with aggressive, confident and competitive behaviour, typical of alpha males and even male animals in the wild, with common themes such as excessive alcohol and drug use as well as settings often being set in pubs and club scenes globally, where party life brings out such characteristics in men.
Much of this was captured in the 60s, 70s and 80s and no doubt would’ve strongly influenced both Mapplethorpe’s and Weinberger’s photographic work. Beginning in the mid-1980s, a secret underground culture was formed by a revolutionary group of self-proclaimed “queers” who were less concerned about mainstream acceptance of their sexuality and more geared toward creating unconventional spaces where they could be themselves. Places where, essentially, someone could be gay without liking stereotypical “gay things.” in the 1970s AIDS broke out which is a disease of the immune system, caused by the virus HIV, leading to death from infections that the body is no longer able to resist. The disease had a devastating effect on the gay community in the 1980’s and many of Mapplethorpe’s friends and acquaintances were victims of the disease. Mapplethorpe died from an AIDS-related illness in 1989.
Robert Michael Mapplethorpe was an American photographer who was most famously known for his work with black and white photographs. His photographs featured a large array of subjects, including celebrity portraits, male and female nudes, self-portraits, and still-life images. Additionally, Mapplethorpe as mentioned was queer, hence this was a common theme in his work as many of his models either recreated or were homosexual themselves. These photos were often aimed to capture ‘lad culture’ through the style and behaviour of men as well as the male gaze. Essentially, the male gaze is the act of depicting women and the world from a masculine, heterosexual perspective that presents and represents women as sexual objects for the pleasure of the heterosexual male viewer.
In Mapplethorpe’s work, one of his major exhibitions named ‘The Perfect Medium’ which was featured at the Art Gallery of New South Wales in 27 Oct 2017 – 18 Feb 2018, showcased a broad selection of his work, from portraits of his contemporaries to self-portraits, floral still lifes and erotic imagery. Mapplethorpe heavily explored ways identity could be captured and expressed by the camera with a certain style of black and white still portraits, almost always taken in a black or white studio and set up with the models or himself creating or imitating poses in front of the camera. Often, his traditional style of portraiture had a clear subject, and this was often the male physique as he tried highlighting both the beauty and form of the ideal male physique (virtruvian physique as mentioned in this blog post). He often captured the brutish, male image, highlighting different appearances that so-called alphas could have, however these characteristics were usually the muscular, confident ‘lad’ stereotype so to speak. Through his self-portraits, he strategically crafted a public image for himself. He often took photos of himself as well as the models that fit the roles of alpha males, and by using the styles as mentioned above, he often challenged gender stereotypes and lad culture, which is a similar theme to my personal study.
The photo above is a studio portrait of Derrick Cross in 1983, a model Mapplethorpe photographed numerous times and included in a couple of his works. This is one of many photographs in which Mapplethorpe focuses on a part of the body. The surrealist artist Man Ray had taken similar photographs of a torso, but had given greater emphasis to the face-like appearance of the body with nipples as eyes and navel as mouth. Mapplethorpe’s photograph is much more a study of muscular form and male beauty and aesthetic. With the draped fabric around his waist, similarities can also be drawn with classical sculpture. The photo was produced on gelatin silver print that gives it the clear, silver and black tones. Additionally, the photo has high contrast as a result of the models’ skin tone when compared to the very pale grey background, which emphasises the significant muscularity of the model. Furthermore, the composition is close up, with the model comprising most of the photograph, in particular his well developed mid-section/torso which evidently, Mapplethorpe is trying to emphasise and highlight the beauty of, especially considering the model has posed similar to Greek statues. Robert himself also photographed many Greek statues and compared them to the male physique, potentially taking inspiration from the philosopher Plato’s study on aesthetics who is considered by many to be “the most important philosopher who ever lived”. He is known as the father of idealism in philosophy and his new (at the time) ideas were elitist, with the philosopher king the ideal ruler. Essentially, the very phrase “Plato’s aesthetics” refers to an anachronism, given that this area of philosophy only came to be identified in the last few centuries, however even those who think of aesthetics more broadly find something exploratory in Plato’s treatments of art and beauty. He might be best described as “seeking to discover the vocabulary and issues of aesthetics”. For this reason Plato’s readers will not come upon a single aesthetic theory in the dialogues. For the same reason they are uniquely situated to watch core concepts of aesthetics being defined: beauty, imitation, inspiration. Tangent aside, Robert Mapplethorpe and his obsession with aesthetics is very evident as he clearly was more concerned with male beauty and aesthetic and sexualising males through homo-erotic staged photos in studio lighting.
Karlheinz Weinberger is another artist that shares a similar style in photography to Mapplethorpe. Karlheinz Weinberger was born on 10 July 1921 in Zurich’s “Chreis Cheib” district, a nickname derived from the Swiss German expression for ‘carcass.’ A few years later, Zurich became a centre for left-wing ideology also known as “Red Zurich” after the Social Democratic party won an absolute majority for the first time in 1928. His imagery shares the similar black and white tones as can be observed in Mapplethorpe’s work as well as sharing a similar theme where by both artists aim to capture ‘lad’ culture, although in Weinberger’s work, it is less sexualised. A striking resemblance in both artist’s work is the inclusion of male models in their portrait work, often either topless or re-enacting “masculine” things. ‘Lad culture’ is ever present in Weinberger’s work, with many of his subjects often being muscular and rather good-looking, taking the role of the confident alpha male type.
Karlheinz Weinberger’s day job may have been relatively uninspiring having worked in a Siemen’s warehouse, however the photos he took in his spare time are anything but that. Weinberger’s passion, and the focus of this book, is the rebel youth of 1950s and 1960s Switzerland, who took inspiration from American rock-’n’-roll culture and made it their own with their rolled-up jeans and denim jackets, bouffant hairdos, striped T-shirts, and customized belts. Weinberger’s free-spirited and self-confident portraits typical of alpha male/lad culture possess the defiant attitude of youth and rebellion as a response to the conservative post-war era. His book ‘Swiss Rebels’ also includes erotic images of queers, who dress as rockers, bikers, construction workers and athletes, many of whom occupy positions outside of social norms.
The photo above is a candid environmental portrait, (a common theme in Weinberger’s work) and was taken by Weinberger in 1970 and is of a Wrestler in a sports club named ‘Box-Ring Zürich’ where he started to work as a freelance sports photographer for Satus-Sport, a national workers’ sports and gymnastics federation. In 1969, the photo taken above also first appeared in an underground gay magazine, called Club 68. The photo incudes a very alpha looking subject with the photo comprising of the typical black and white theme similar to Mapplethorpe’s works. Visually, the photo is black and white, with darkish tones in the background, cleverly segregating the subject in the fore ground and stopping him from blending in too much. Furthermore, there is a rough texture with the subtle grain typical of cameras of the time unlike Mapplethorpe’s work that was often very clear, although, much of Weinberger’s photography was also very clear too with minimal/to no grain what so ever. The composition is a strong one, symbolic of the alpha male/lad culture vibe and is in the form of a candid portrait that looks semi-staged and the subject is centred making for a pleasing symmetrical image that is satisfying to look at and matches the golden ratio. The exposure is a little higher in order to cancel out the shadows from dominating the image and ruining the clarity, as here the photo is very clear signifying great balance and harmony between the limited shades within the photo. Technically, it is unknown if Weinberger used natural or studio (indoor) lighting nor is it possible to determine what camera/lens he used although I would hazard a guess and say her may have used a 35mm film camera, typical of the era and likely the cause of the grain. Unlike Mapplethorpe, Weinberger isn’t asking his subjects to make poses symbolic of Greek gods, however opting for a more candid approach. Furthermore, another difference between the two artists approach to photographing males and portraying lad culture is rather than trying to highlight the aesthetic of the male physique in it’s greatest form, Weinberger finds an aesthetic in men doing manly things as a pose to looking overly muscular and posing as such. Evidently, Weinberger was more concerned with highlighting lad culture through environmental photos of men whereas Mapplethorpe was more concerned with male beauty and aesthetic by sexualising males through staged photos in studio lighting. Therefore, notice how when I referred to both artist’s work, with Weinberger I mentioned how he used ‘subjects’ and with Mapplethorpe how he used ‘models’. That’s the key difference here.
Overall, both artists capture the male gaze, however go about it in a slightly different way. Granted, both often photographed queer culture and the surrounding community, however as mentioned, Mapplethorpe used this to create more homo-erotic imagery that explored the male body’s natural beauty and form, most notably seen in his work with Derrick Cross, whereas Weinberger preferred the less staged, more natural/candid approach where photos of groups of males doing certain activities were more his kind of niche. Weinberger was more concerned with highlighting lad culture through enivonamntal photos of men doing ‘manly’ or ‘lad culture’ things, (boys being boys essentially), as he worked in a factory for Siemens which was full of these ‘stud-like’ masculine characters that weren’t afraid to get hands on and dirty. On the other hand, Mapplethorpe as mentioned, sexualised males and explored the more flamboyant, fashion side of lad-culture. This makes for a great contrast between the two artists, as both their work looks very similar in style from first observation, however can be interpreted in entirely different ways.
This project had some personal significance and although certain scenes were quite difficult for me to film, mentally, I believe that all in all it helped with my own recovery and I’m glad I went through with the film. I think it reflects not only some of my own story but also, more generally, it symbolises a range of experiences and feelings that people have when they are going through periods of poor mental health, not only struggles with diet.
I explored the link to the “Love and Rebellion” theme through the idea of self-love and rebellion against a toxic mindset and societal expectations. In my opinion, it was successful, although I feel as though I could maybe have focused more on the self-love aspect in the end, but as a result of the importance of the three separate chapters, I wasn’t able to spend too much time on only a single one.
CLOTHING/LOCATION-
Both the clothing and the locations were very important to me. I chose to have three different outfits: one for each chapter. Seeing as each chapter represented a different stage of the ED journey, I thought the clothing should reflect the general mental situation at the time. The first was a long sleeved shirt and a long skirt which covered up most of my body but was still fairly close to my skin, illustrating the sense of self-consciousness building before the actual disorder changes the perception of the body too much. The second outfit was a plain white long-sleeved dress, which fell a little baggy on my body and covered up pretty much all of it, showing how self-consciousness increases and the desire to hide yourself/your body in your clothing is also very prominent. In the third chapter I wore a white cropped top and the same white skirt from the first chapter to show how I was returning to my former self but changed, recovered and showing more outward self-confidence. All three of the outfits were white, for a few different reasons: white symbolises innocence and purity which can be reflected in both the first and last chapters, white stands out against the otherwise natural colour palatte of the background, therefore drawing focus towards me as the central focus of the film, and white also links to the voiceover which features the “white rabbit” from the Alice in Wonderland books.
The locations I filmed in were also significant. Most of it is filmed in and around my house, which references how EDs often stem from issues at home and revolve around routines and habits done at home. This is similar to the way the Laia Abril’s book “The Epilogue” revolves around the house of a young girl who suffered from an eating disorder. The rest is filmed in a patch of nearby woods, which at the same time references Alice in Wonderland and the popular metaphor of “going into the woods” as meaning going on a dangerous and challenging quest with reasonable doubt as to whether one would return safe. It also meant that I was able to work in an environment that was quite colourful, and the time of year meant that the green was quite vibrant, and the weather was often rainy which added general atmosphere and mood to the film.
SEQUENCING/CHAPTERS-
The chapters were a vital aspect of the film to me; they showed the journey one goes on with an eating disorder in three separate stages. The titles reference the Alice in Wonderland books and mark the stages of before, during and after. When evaluating, I think they worked effectively in portraying the sense of the passing of time that I wanted them to.
I also use some repeated shots, like the “getting ready” morning scene and the close up of eyes opening and looking around. I intended this to give the audience a sense of how the subject’s mental health changes over time, relying on the artistic trope of the eyes being “windows to the soul” to portray this.
Sequencing the shots and generally organising the narrative was an aspect I put quite a bit of thought into, and I ended up making a fairly detailed storyboard which I then annotated with details for me to use when actually shooting; I found this really helpful throughout the whole process, especially when editing. It was quite effective in that, when re-evaluating some shots later on in the process, I was able to cut them out easily and maintain the whole narrative of the rest of the film without missing out on anything important. In my opinion, it was definitely worth the extra time spent in the planning process.
VOICEOVER-
From the very beginning, I had planned to record myself doing a scripted voiceover, with the visuals matching up to whatever was being said at the moment. I debated either reading out a poem from the book “Alice Through The Looking Glass” or to write something myself, and in the end the poem in particular was too short and didn’t link up with the subject matter of the film enough, so I wrote a short three-piece text, making sure to include imagery that fit with the theme of eating disorders and Alice in Wonderland, then went through the process of editing it to the right length and omitting any parts that didn’t particularly work out in the way I liked. Certain key lines and phrases, however, were important to keep in as they gave sense to the visuals and added to the overall tone of the film.
For example:
“Little white lies stick like cotton wool in my throat and nothing is the same anymore.”
The white lies refer to the deception involved in hiding an ED from friends and family, and the cotton wool refers to a popular method of appetite suppressing by consuming cotton wool.
“I got stuck and I got hurt/ And I got help”
This is from the third and final chapter and it shows the period of self-reflection that is necessary for recovery where often things that were complicated at the time become simple and much clearer to understand.
“My childhood seems a blur to me/ Although I don’t really know why” … “My childhood is still blurry, but it’s soft and sweet and sad, and I tell it to take its time coming back to me”
These two quotes are from chapters one and three respectively, and they illustrate how much personal growth occurs during recovery and how often there is an increased sense of acceptance of past pain and upsets, rather than holding on to them and hurting oneself any further.
Overall, the extra effort involved in scripting, recording and editing in a voiceover was most definitely worth it, in my opinion, and I am pleased with the final effect it had. It added a personal touch to the film and made a lot of the imagery clearer to understand, as well as adding more depth to other parts. It also allowed me to explore a different side of the creative aspect when making films, and increased my awareness of the importance of audio and soundscapes.
OVERALL SUCCESSES + CRITIQUES–
Technically, I think my film was fairly successful. Visually it looked good, as the colours I wore stood out against the various surroundings, and the exposure was properly calibrated. As a whole the narrative was clear, conveyed through both visual and audio aspects together. It had a range of close ups and long shots, and the establishing shots at the beginning set the scene effectively. The editing was also varied enough to keep it engaging, switching between several fast-paced montages and some slower, longer scenes. I mainly used a tripod to keep the camera steady which tested my multitasking skills and improved my overall filming/directing techniques, as well as allowing me to use myself as the main subject.
If I had to critique any part of it, I would probably say that I could have spent a bit more time during the actual filming part in making sure that everything was in focus. This was only really an issue in the first parts that I shot, the close-ups particularly, and even though it was hard to be behind the camera while also being the subject of the camera lens, I feel as though if I were to do it again I would know to spend a lot more time on things like this and end up with a slightly better result. Another thing I would change if I did this project again would be to include more scenes of a more abstract nature, like the photography of Francesca Woodman, which would be open for interpretation in various different ways and provide a more creative and artistic demonstration of the main subject’s mental state.
To conclude, I’m pleased with the way this short film project turned out and I believe I was successful in the various things I meant to include. The artists I studied beforehand were very useful in developing my ideas and the style that I went for, as well as providing examples of work covering similar sorts of subjects. I feel like I managed to incorporate a personal aspect in tackling a difficult and fairly emotionally challenging topic, and I put a lot of effort into making sure that I provided as accurate of a representation to my own experiences as I could, without making it overly specific and opening it up to a more general interpretation of mental health issues, the concept of losing childhood nostalgia, rediscovering one’s own identity, and just generally growing up.
Sound was very important to me in this film project, and I spent a lot of time scripting a voiceover to have underneath the video, to combine both the audio and visual aspects together. But I also wanted to use a lot of natural sounds, the sort of ambient noise that would be present in the outside environments I filmed in. Initially I believed this would be best done by using sounds downloaded online, but I tested out my camera’s audio and found it worked well in capturing exactly what I wanted. This accounts for the most part of the ambient background noise, excepting the hospital sounds at the end of “chapter two”, which I had to source online.
BACKGROUND/AMBIENT SOUNDS-
Above I am splicing the original clip from inside a hospital room I got online into separate shorter pieces, as it had a recurring background sound (like an aggressively loud beep) that I didn’t like, so I marked out all the sections it was heard and cut them out. I was anxious that the end product didn’t sound too jarring or mix-and-match, but luckily it worked perfectly well first time, and I only had to cut the whole clip to the right length and no further editing was necessary.
