Since the concept is positioned around my mum, there will be scenes including her. However, due to ethical reasons I am not wanting to expose her too much and make her uncomfortable. I also don’t think it would be nice to expose her at her worst. I do want to reveal the struggles, however filming her having an exacerbation/attack would be quite unethical.
Therefore, I will only get a few shots of her. Some visuals I am thinking of are: her lying/sitting down on the sofa after a tough day (this is because the lounge is where she is most and will be an environmental shot), I may get some visuals of me and her shopping as I help her at the shop weekly due to the experience being too tough for her to do by herself. I would most probably like to get some shots of her tattoos, since this makes up the person that she is today, potentially her in her room, using her nebulizer, struggling to walk etc.
When getting some shots of her using her nebulizer or struggling to walk, I’m going to exclude her face as I feel like this may make her uncomfortable and may be over-exposing her which is what I don’t want since I want this to be a respectful and thoughtful piece of work. Thus, I will use medium/close up shots of her lower body that includes crucial subjects like the nebulizer for example.
I may also want to get some shots of my 14 year old sister, Mary doing some chores around the house. This is to show that my mum does need that extra help around the house as she struggles to do it by herself.
Additionally, referring to the prompt question below “What do you remember about being young?” I may want to include some archive images of my mum of when she was younger. This would add strong contrast within my film, showing what she looked and lived like before and what she looks and lives like now.
VOICEOVER
For my audio I’d like to insert an audio of my mum speaking about her illness. Therefore, I need to create a list of prompt questions in order to get the audio that I would like. I feel as though her telling her own story will add the hard-hitting aspect of my film.
The questions will be:
What do you remember about being young? (Health wise)
When did you begin to notice feeling unwell?
How would you describe the feeling of your illness?
What’s your worst memory about being ill?
Are there any side effects to your illness?
What do you struggle with the most?
What is your biggest regret?
What is the next step for you?
What are some things you wish you were able to do?
This will most likely provide me with a lengthy audio to play with and edit and include upsetting but factual elements that happen in her life.
In addition to the voice over I’d also like to include some background noise just to fill in the gaps in the audio that may be apparent and to make the film also pleasant to listen to and not just to watch. I’m thinking that a slow heart beat sound may be a good background sound to represent hospitals, illness, getting through life etc and again to make the film more hard hitting.
WHAT?
Aside from clips of my mum I also want to include clips of my home and other elements that surround my mum and her illness.
I most definitely want to include her wide range of medications. This will provide me with a number of clips since she has too many to even count. I feel as though that this as well will be very striking to the viewers at how much medication she has to consume in order to keep her going. I would like to include clips of her bedroom as that is her place of rest and belongs to her and therefore connotes to her. I want to symbolise my mum in various ways as I feel like this adds some ambiguity to my film and allows the audience to think and also allows them to listen to the audio more closely since that is the main focus. Additionally, Id like to include different aesthetic visuals in my film just to add some interesting elements into the footage also. Things like shadows on the walls, windows, sunsets etc.
WHERE?
Most of the footage will take place in my home since my main visuals will be of my mum in the lounger, bedroom etc. This is where all her medication is also. Also because my mum rarely goes out due to the extreme anxiety she experiences when thinking about walking anywhere due to it being so difficult for her. Therefore, in order to keep her comfort and to keep the film as natureal as possible, most of the filming will be done at home.
However, I will also get some footage when at the shop and if we are ever out for a walk, to show how breathless she gets just from walking.
The voice over will also happen at home as this is where I can most likely get the most quiet area and to get a clear and thorough audio of my mum’s experiences. This also will increase my mum’s comfort and hopefully allow her to speak from her heart without any pressure.
HOW?
I will be filming on one of the Canon’s lended by school. In previous films I have made, I used my iPhone. However, due to the topic of this film and how important it is to me, I would like it to be in the best quality possible. But, if we are out and there is a something that strikes me as a quality piece of footage, I won’t hesitate to film it on my phone, making sure that it is in landscape so that it matches the layout of the other pieces of footage.
Before starting to film, I will gain the consent of my mum and my sister. This is because I may film them automatically while they’re doing their every-day things. Therefore, I don’t want to disturb them and then have an artificial piece of footage. I want my footage to be as natural as possible and therefore I will gain their consent and inform them that I may be filming them at various different times due to this photography project.
For my voice over, I will film the ‘interview’ on my camera. Then, I will upload the footage onto Premiere on my laptop, discard the visual footage and keep just the audio.
A sentence: The story is about a tomboy who likes to skate and hangs out with guys.
A paragraph: A girls who is considered one of the boys, has more male friends than girl friends. A girl who likes to skate and surf and do things a typical guy would like to do. But society feels the need to put a label on her TOMBOY even though she is very much a girl and like do go get her nails done and loves shopping.
Design: Consider the following
How you want your book to look and feel
Colour, I want it to feel moody but still have light and some colour, I have decided to put in only some images with graffiti in the book as I feel like graffiti or ARTISTS that like to publicly display their art this way are shunned and also stereotyped much like SKATERS and ‘TOMBOYS’ as most consider it ‘VANDALISM’ rather than ART and people expressing themselves. Although society has started to accept some artists and some people even pay for a graffiti artist to put his design on sides of buildings which makes me feel happy that times are slowly changing but some are still stuck in their old mentality.
Paper and ink
black ink
Format, size and orientation
Standard A4 portrait (20x25cm)
Binding and cover
Hardcover with a Dust Jacket
Title: TRIBE inc. ina graffiti style if I can find a font that’s decent on either photoshop or lightroom.
It is going to be in black.
Design and layout
Most pages are going to be full bleed while others are in a different layout. A lot like organised Chaos.
Editing and sequencing
I want a smooth transition between the images also I would want it to be unpredictable for the reader and have some random double page spreads.
Images and text
The essay at the end of the photobook, the Title and my name will be on the first page and have an opening Quote. I will also have some direct quotes from skaters/ my friends on top/ next to some photos.
In What Way Have Richard Billingham and Matthew Finn Photographed People Who Are Close to Them?
“An inside position allows engagement, participation and privileged knowledge.” (Abigail-Solomon Godeau: Inside/Out)
In this essay I will be evaluating the different ways as to how Richard Billingham and Matthew Finn have photographed people that are close to them, in this case, their parents. My area of study in my personal project is documentary photography. This is a style of photography that provides a straightforward and accurate representation of people, places, objects and events. Specifically, I am looking into filmmaking using a documentary approach. I am positioning it around my mum, particularly, creating a documentary film in order to expose the hardships and complications that she faces on a day-to-day basis while struggling with a terminal illness – Stage 4 Emphysema. My overall aim of my project is to create a hard-hitting film that triggers powerful emotions for the viewer. Since I am also filming someone who is close to me, I feel as though looking into Billingham’s and Finn’s methods will add greater knowledge to my personal work and allow me to potentially take notes from the methods they have used when photographing their own parents. Billingham started off by taking images of his parents (with no prior experience) for reference so that he could paint them, as his main aim before photography was painting. His images of his parents then got noticed and became a huge success. The images exposed his tough life living in a tower block with his alcoholic Dad, Ray, and his overweight, temperamental mum, Liz. The exposure of his parents was intriguing to viewers and he eventually led on to create several documentary style films surrounding his parents. Matthew Finn took images of his Mother for over thirty years. His father did not live with him and he stated that his first intentions were not to create an archive of his mother, but to create stability, the photographing eventually became a habit. The more Finn discovered about his father, the more he wanted to protect his mum and be the person/man that would never let her down. The fact that his mother was wanted and needed to be in his photography, formed a strong bond between the two and she played a huge role in the making of the photographs. Years later, she developed dementia, and could no longer recognise Finn or herself even, thus, all he had left were these archival images.
Contextually, Abigail Solomon-Godeau published an essay, Inside / Out, that became incredibly successful. She discussed what she refers to as the inside/outside position of photographers in relation to their subjects. Referring to the opening quote above, she believes that an inside position (when you are close with your subjects and have a personal relationship with them) “allows engagement, participation and privileged knowledge” (Solomon-Godeau 1994: pg2). It’s an intimate, trusting and engaging role for photographers and their subjects that often allows authenticity. She then goes on to say that an outside position can often be objectifying, distant and unsympathetic – since there is no personal relationship with their subjects and no ‘inside’ point of view.
Diane Arbus
Consider this image above taken by Diane Arbus of transvestites. She often depicted people who were seen as ’different’ at the time e.g., gay people/people with disabilities etc – Solomon-Godeau, in her essay, criticises the work of Arbus. Arbus specifically takes an outsider’s point of view to photography and has often been accused of basing her photography on ’distance and privilege’ rather than using her photographs for positive effect. She has often been described as having a ’guilty pleasure’ when it came to photographing people who were different and was accused of being voyeuristic in her approach. Thus, an inside perspective to photography can be known as the” good position” as an outside position can be very controversial and used for the wrong reasons. However, having an inside position also has its pros and cons. One con is that having an inside position can be very socially sensitive, and sometimes may be over personal, gritty and brutal. Due to Richard Billingham and Matthew Finn being very close to their subjects – their family members, they most definitely have an inside position to their work but are they using their positions for the right reasons and how is their position revealed through their work?
As mentioned earlier, Richard Billingham revealed his tough life with his unique family members, specifically his parents Liz and Ray. His photos and films were extremely intriguing as they were extremely high in ecological validity and gave us a truly real experience within his images – no set up composition, no plan, just simple, raw images that exposed his own life.
Richard Billingham
Take this photograph for example, within this one image, there’s a number of things that maybe other photographers wouldn’t see as visually pleasing: slouching, food stains, a generally messy frame, an obese Mum and a drunken Father. Billingham, quite clearly, takes an inside approach to his work, since the circumstances he depicts would only be seen privately in your own home. Billingham is one of the only people that would’ve had access to his parents in this way. This is what made his photos so unique and special, the lack of accessibility to these kinds of photos, showing a lower-class life and the events that occur within it are fascinating and hard-hitting. Billingham’s insider position is what brought his images to success. Due to his close relationship with his Dad, Billingham stated ’I don’t think he took any notice,’ [when filming] – this emphasises the rawness of Billingham’s images and films as no behaviour was exaggerated and all was an accurate representation of his life. Richard’s overall aim wasn’t to expose his parents in a negative light; therefore, he didn’t use his inside position to objectify or to distance himself. After all, his first intentions were to paint the images of his Mother and Father in the style of Post-Impressionist art. On the other hand, you could argue, that after realising that the images of his parents were the key to his success, he then continued to use them to his advantage in order to gain more attention. Similarly, he has been accused of over-exposing his parents, and that filming his parents in a vulnerable position was unethical. Like me, Billingham takes a documentary style approach to his images and films, he claimed, ’I didn’t want images of the tragedy of the situation. I wanted them to be emotionally very moving’ (Richard Billingham: Photoworks, 2007). This then, suggests that his insider position wasn’t used to expose/objectify his parents, but to create an emotional effect for his audience.
Matthew Finn
Matthew Finn, took pictures of his Mother for over 30 years, exposing the shift from middle-age to old-age. His work is described as a ’poignant body of work, filled with warmth yet conscious of the fragility of life’. Like Billingham, Matthew’s work also takes a documentary style to his work, representing an account of life, a deeply humanistic response to a set of human circumstances. Since this project with his Mother was so personal, Finn also clearly took an inside perspective when it came to photographing. There is no objectivity or distance within his photographs since one of his intentions were to create presence [of his mother] within his work. His images show the definition of an inside perspective, allowing ’engagement, participation and privileged knowledge’. He used this position for positive effect, since he gathered these images over a long period of time, and only published them when his Mother essentially disappeared due to the onset of dementia. The photographs are those of remembrance and respect, which demonstrates the advantages of an insider’s perspective; to look back on personal memories that the photographer and subject experienced in real life. His inside perspective also outlines other pros; he was able to photograph his Mother over a long period of time. This, as mentioned, showed the shift in her life and preserved her beauty. An outsider’s perspective wouldn’t have that kind of opportunity and makes Finn’s photographs interesting and raw. Additionally, due to his personal perspective, he was able to capture his Mother doing mundane, everyday tasks, which again isn’t accessible from an outsider’s perspective. His images provide the true bond and trust that Finn and his Mother, Jean have.
Comparatively, it is apparent that both photographers demonstrate an insider’s perspective when photographing their family members. Often, an inside perspective is criticised due to its over-exposure and social sensitivity. However, both photographers’ aims are clearly not to objectify their subjects. Billingham clearly wanted a factual and raw take to his work to create an emotional response to his audience, and had no intention at all to create negative connotations surrounding his Dad’s drinking etc. He stated, ‘I didn’t want to illustrate alcoholism or make a documentary about it’(Richard Billingham: Photoworks,2007). This again shows that he wasn’t using his perspective to expose his Father in any way and used his photography positively. Billingham also has stated that he had no specific aesthetic in mind when it came to visuals, and again just wanted footage that was 100% true to his life that he experiences. Matthew Finn had an extremely close bond with his Mother, especially after his Father left and secrets were revealed. Like Billingham, Finn had no intention of publishing the images that he had taken. Overall, however, his images show a very close, positive relationship between the two. Finn obviously had no negative intentions when it came to photographing his Mum, instead, his photos reflect great admiration and love for her. One difference between the two artists is, Billingham’s relationship with his parents seems somewhat distant. He has stated in the past that he hated growing up in a tower block with his parents. In some way, Billingham reveals the emotional turmoil that appears often in their flat. The behaviour seen in his images and documentaries, especially from his Father, often impact the audience so much because of how shocking it was. It is difficult to imaging the effect that, that environment had on Billingham. On the other hand, Finn’s images reflect love, memory and closeness with his Mother. Although the images were documentary style, he always seemed to capture his Mother in her best light, and the images have been softly adjusted, creating an atmosphere of admiration for the closest person in his life. In conclusion, the relationship to their subject’s is clearly very different.
In conclusion, my analysis of both artists’ perspectives has inspired the methods that I will use when filming my own Mum. Since Matthew Finn’s perspective is a little more personal and reflects the bond that the two had I will most likely be referring a little closer to his methods. I, overall aim to create a respectful, loving video for my Mother, showing my appreciation for her and my understanding of her illness. My perspective will evidently be from the inside, since I’m uncovering details of mine and my Mother’s personal life that only we have access to. However, Billingham’s documentary-style, film-making methods are what I will be looking to when it comes to visuals. I want to capture, raw, real-life footage of my Mum and the experiences we go through. This will be more hard-hitting for the audience, in my opinion. Unlike Billingham however, I’m not wanting to capture my Mum in a negative light, as this will essentially defeat the point of my project. I enjoy the fact that Finn created a large archive of his Mother before publishing the images. This inspires me to add older, archival images of my own Mum in order to reveal a ‘shift’ in her, going from healthy, happy and lively to ill, tired and struggling. Overall, an inside perspective allows me to have access to footage that no one else would and gives access to a wide range of information about my subject, thus forming an authentic, detailed movie that shows a close relationship between me and my Mother. My close relationship with my Mum and my inside perspective also allows me to have empathy with her whereas an outsiders perspective may be objectifying and may not show the true effects of her illness.
After seeing some graffiti photos I took these words appeared in one of the photos and was suggested for it to be the title of the book. I thought it would be clever as the skate community in jersey is quite small making Tribe inc an appropriate tittle as tribes nowadays are quite small but tight community. Everyone Knows Someone Who Everyone type of thing.SHORT QUOTE one of my friends said in a high pitch voice while trying to imitate me. I really liked this layout HOWEVER i decided to change around the layout of the bottom quote and my name because i felt it didn’t really fit well.This layout option it a more classical approach; full bleed page with a white blank page next to it. I liked this layout look for its simplicity, as some images can get quite busy with the action going on.This layout option is slightly more contemporary; with a full bleed page next to a white page with a smaller photograph next to it. I also liked this layout look for its simplicity, as images don’t always need a blank page sometimes a n image is needed to give the effect it needs. I felt that this also linked in with a more contemporary/post-modernism vibe.I felt like a double page spread full bleed pages would add some effect to the photobook. This layout is one of my favourites and is definitely going to be repeated through out. Although it would have to be followed by a blank page or a page with a good amount of white, so it doesn’t over crowd the book and become too intense or loose meaning. I felt like a double page spread full bleed pages would of made the photobook too busy and its important to have bits of white showing through so this layout is great and also quite modern with an image overlapping it but not taking away any attention. the quote on top of the image is directly from the skaters/ my friends that I’ve been photographing, during this stressful time of covid and the last lockdown.I felt like a I needed a sequence layout of two different skate ‘tricks’. For this layout I felt like I wanted to add this in as its the opposite to one of the other layout options and the two would alternate and add some structure to the photobook.Final Sequencing Of Photobook!
First i uploaded the album of all the videos from this shoot into the side bar as there were all large 4k files
Once all the videos were imported, i had a lot of footage and checked over which i wanted to include. With one clip it was very shaky so i applied a warp stabilizer affect and rendered the video, making it much smoother, and cut it to a shorter length.
Next i cut all the clips simply together, mixing between ‘drone’ and skating footage, and adjusted all the audio to have some of the natural sounds, but more mellow as there’s also going to be an overlay of building music in the background
I then imported the audio, which runs through all the field clips, and altered the volume, which will fade in and out from the before and after clips.
Lastly used cross dissolve on two clips to create a fading transition from ‘live’ filming to it appearing on a screen, and ran the live audio through
WHAT: For this shoot I want to capture the details inside my grandad’s Mini Cooper S. His car is the Sports pack model so has a lot of racing cooper details.
WHERE/WHEN: In my yard when it is cloudy so there is soft light. Shooting when it is cloudy means that the light is soft so it is easier to expose and the shadows won’t be as hard. The location doesn’t really matter because I will be photographing the inside of the car so I will take the photos in my yard outside my house as I have as much space as I need and can take as long as needed to get all the shots I want.
EQUIPMENT: I will use my sony a73 for all these photos as this is my main camera and has the best image quality. I have a selection of lenses I am going to use. I have a 16mm f2.8 lens for the wide shots of the inside where I want to capture more of inside the car. But for all the details I will use my 50mm f1.8 lens as the aperture is wide so it allows more light into the car as the car may be quite dark inside. The 50mm is more zoomed in which means there is more lens compression, this along with the wide aperture will help to isolate the subject from the background and there will be a nice amount of bokeh. I won’t need a tripod for this photoshoot as I want the flexibility to move around and there won’t be enough room in the car.
CONTACT SHEET
I actually did two photoshoots of this car in the same location. The first one was when we first picked up my grandad’s car. The sun was harsh and there were hard shadows. There was a big diagonal shadow on the car which I though looked good. I took one set of images while the shadows were hard then I went back a bit later when the car was completely covered in shadow so I could take some photos with nice soft lighting.
EDITED IMAGES
I was really happy with the outcome of these photos. I like the way the harsh shadows fall on some of the images. When taking the photos I used manual focus at times to make sure I got perfect focus on the things I wanted. Because there were a lot of logos I wanted to make sure that the whole logo was in focus, this meant sometimes stopping down the aperture from 1.8 to 2.8 or even smaller.
EDITING
RAW
Edited
This was one of my favourite images. I wanted to make the image feel cold and have contrast. First I adjusted the basics like exposure, highlights and shadows to correct the overall exposure. Then I added an S Curve to add some contrast but raised the blacks to give it a more filmic look. I added blue into the shadows and a little yellow into the highlights. The blue in the shadows really makes the image feel cold. I then desaturated the blues and greens so the blues were not overpowering the image. I added a vignette to add focus to the handle.
I didn’t edit every image the same as some of the photos didn’t work as well with the edit. I made some black and white to show variety and because they looked better in black and white.
In what way does the work of Francesca Woodman explore the concepts of femininity and sexuality ?
“Woodman’s photographs show a subject poised between presence and absence, where the body seems to hesitate in its visibility and identity.”
Townsend C, 2006, “Francesca Woodman: Scattered in Space and Time“
INTRODUCTION-
The concept of femininity, its definitions and boundaries, has been explored thousands of times by multitudes of photographers, artists, philosophers and writers, female or not. It changes again and again with each individual interpretation and cultural movement, with the waves of feminism, and with the passing of artistic and cultural movements. The idea that there is an inherent essence to being female has been examined in depth by many artists, writers, philosophers and linguists, including by Judith Butler, whose work “Gender Trouble” revolutionised the way femininity and gender in general is thought of and discussed academically, as well as having a massive impact on the LGBTQ+ community, where gender and sexuality are often seen as fundamentally intertwined and are often questioned and analysed. These notions can all be seen to be represented in, an influence on, or interpreted in Francesca Woodman’s work in some way. From her depiction of her own femininity and sexuality, I believe that Woodman’s work is exceptional in portraying how she views these concepts in a way that is not only original but also has links to other artistic and cultural movements. In this essay I will explore how she connects her personal experience with other photographers’ work and her understanding of the photographic and artistic scene surrounding her work. I will provide an in-depth analysis of her work and discuss how it illustrates her experience with her own femininity. I will explain how she explores her sexuality look at contextual factors and other links to cultural and artistic movements, artists and themes.
THEORETICAL CONTEXT-
Women in the world of art and cinema have continually been portrayed, mainly by men, as sexual objects; their purpose being for exhibition only. Laura Mulvey puts it simply, “in their traditional exhibitionist role women are simultaneously looked at and displayed” (Mulvey 1975:19) which accurately explains the persistent representation of the female body as an object of desire first and foremost, both for the artist and characters within the artwork or film as well as the spectator. This perception of women as sexual objects can be linked to many traditional social attitudes regarding gender roles and can be argued to be the base of modern rape culture. However, this connection between a person’s sex and their gender has been furiously debated for decades and probably longer, possibly most notably by Judith Butler in her iconic and transformative book “Gender Trouble”. Her main points can be summarised as this: gender is a socially constructed performance, people’s gender identities are often far more complex than society expects, and the fact that women are socialised to fit within a set of defined “feminine” characteristics. In simple terms, “sex is not the biological meaning of gender and is socially constructed by norms, just as gender is an ongoing performance” (Marilou Niedda, 2020;1). Butler theorises that there is a clear disconnect between a person’s biological sex and their gender, meaning androgyny is a completely valid and understood form of gender expression. Androgyny in photography is used by many artists, often female ones, to distance themselves from the over-sexualised images of women which are seemingly everywhere in art and film, to show themselves as artists breaking barriers, and to represent women in general as more than just erotic objects.
I am in training, don’t kiss me (Claude Cahun, 1927)
Presenting oneself as androgynous was used by Surrealists especially, because it subverted typical expectations of how women were portrayed in art, and it sometimes even caused controversy within the art world. It is essentially a way of fighting back against the fetishisation of the female body and against the male gaze, and the fact that Woodman was a teenager when she first started making these images makes it all the more impressive. The idea that “acting feminine” is an ongoing performance brought on by social expectations was famously explored by Simone de Beauvoir in her book The Second Sex (1949), “one is not born but rather becomes a woman,” which can be interpreted as an explanation of how traditionally feminine behaviour isn’t the natural state of being for people born to the female sex. Furthermore it can be said that the use of androgyny and femininity in art and photography, not only by Woodman but by everyone, is more of a statement of confrontation against traditional femininity than conformity to gender norms.
Sín titulo (Oda a la Necrophilia) by Kati Horna (1962). Image via Museo Reina Sofia.
WOODMAN IN RELATION TO FEMININITY-
“In 1986 Abigail Solomon-Godeau presented Woodman as a prodigy who could be understood as critiquing the historical and linguistic construction of femininity and trying to produce an essentially feminist aesthetic” (Townsend 2006). Often in highly posed and abstract positions, she mainly uses herself as the subject of her images as well as other women and the occasional man, almost always featuring nudity in a way that de-sexualises their bodies and creates a strange sense of experimentation and self-exploration, where the viewer neither feels like a peeping-Tom nor engaged in a sexual act, but rather a witness to her grasp of her own femininity and sexuality, which is fluid and questioning in nature.
This can be explored by Butler’s theory of gender performance, namely “to say that gender is performative is to say that nobody really is a gender from the start” (Butler, 2011). Below are a few examples of Woodman’s use of nudity in her artwork in which there is no sexual aspect, which is in direct contrast to the vast majority of art (not just photography) featuring nude women. This could be interpreted in a couple ways, for example that it is simply the experimentative steps of a teenager who does not fully see herself as a sexual being yet. On the other hand, it could be perceived as a deliberate and premeditated attempt to break barriers surrounding women in the world of art by using her own body to contradict the idea that the female body can only be a sexual thing. Whichever of these interpretations one subscribes to, there is a prominent sense of androgyny and fluidity in these images and, indeed, throughout Woodman’s whole body of work, that demonstrates her incredible talent and capability to provide actual meaning and thought alongside aesthetically and technically pleasing artwork.
Self Deceit #1 (Roma), Francesca Woodman
Woodman’s signature use of long exposure to achieve a blurred body has been construed in many different ways, but most often as a form of disappearance. She is essentially hiding herself in the environment she chooses to surround herself in, but for what reason? The far-left image features a nude Woodman creeping around a corner on her hands and knees to face a mirror. It is one of the few images where the camera blur does not obscure her face, and her use of a mirror to reflect the camera’s “eye” back onto itself gives us an insight into how she sees herself. She appears curious, but tentative and maybe even fearful, revealing how her teenage self is going through a period where her identity and self-perception becomes important. She was nineteen at the time this was taken, so although she may not have known it, she was only a few years away from the end of her career and her life. The second image is different in that, while she is still fully nude, her entire body is obscured by blur due to her manipulation of the camera’s exposure, and her face is not visible. She has positioned herself within a hole in the headstone of a grave (a common feature of some older graves), and so is, in a rather morbid way, encasing herself in death. This could symbolise how she feels like herself and her body is trapped within life itself, or possibly how she sees death as a way of “passing through” to another place. The key point is that her body is not meant to be perceived as sexual in any way, even though she is entirely nude, which feels very modern and liberating. Another interpretation of this image is that it is the way her body is literally emerging from childhood into womanhood, using the grave as a metaphor for this. Any way it is perceived, it is clear that Woodman uses her signature long exposure technique to further present her interpretation of her own femininity and sexuality in a vague and androgynous manner.
COMPARING WOODMAN TO MICHALS-
One of Woodman’s most obvious influences- and also one of the only ones she acknowledged as an influence on her artwork- was Duane Michals. He is an American Surrealist photographer, born in 1932, who mainly creates cinematic narratives through sequences of highly staged images, but also has taken many portraits of influential artists, such as Andy Warhol and Marcel Duchamp, over the course of his career. There are several clear similarities between his body of work and Woodman’s, possibly most obviously their use of long exposure techniques to intentionally blur the subjects of their photography.
People Eat People (1974), Duane Michals
People Eat People (1974), Duane Michals
Above is an example of both Michal’s creation of narratives through sequences as well as this photographic technique. The dark background in focus contrasted against the bright white and blurry figures in the foreground help to make this photo-series impactful and emphasise the emotions portrayed in the second image: fear, shock, horror, hunger. Michals uses blur in a different way to Woodman, however, using it to further the narrative and his intentions behind the photograph rather than directly impacting the perception of the main subject, like Woodman does.
Duane Michals
Francesca Woodman
Both artists also use mirrors in their work as a way to portray how the subject sees themself, whether positively or negatively. Michals’ image above can be interpreted as reflecting how the subject has a distorted perception of themselves, and Woodman uses it in a similar way, but in a less literal manner. They both have fairly high tonal ranges which add depth and make the images more interesting overall, capturing the attention of potential viewers. In Woodman’s image, the whitest part of the photograph is the floor directly behind the subject’s head’s reflection in the mirror, which serves to make it the main focal point. In Michals’ photograph, the whitest part is clearly the strip of wall behind the mirror the subject is holding up, which has the same effect as Woodman in that the subject’s reflection is very obviously the intended main focus of the image as a whole.
‘Untitled, from Angel Series, Rome, Italy’, Francesca Woodman
The Fallen Angel (1968), Duane Michals
Another notable area Michal’s influence on Woodman is the use of angelic imagery, shown above. “The Fallen Angel” (1968) is a photo-series about a girl and an angel who succumbs to his lust for the girl and kisses her but loses his wings as a result and is overcome by guilt and shame. This is a more traditionally Biblical portrayal of angels; the angel being male, and the concept of human sexuality is surrounded by shame and other negative emotions. This is in contrast to Woodman’s use of angels in her “Angel Series” (1977) in Italy, where she is the angel herself and is also nude, but in a way where it feels liberating and joyful overall rather than shameful. These differences can be attributed to both Woodman’s youth and her femininity altering her perception of angels and the nude human body, contrary to Michals, who is male and was 36 at the time of the “Fallen Angel” series. Michals’ photo-series also features a nude female woman, who is lying on her side on the bed. Her body is entirely facing the camera (and therefore the viewer) and her role in the narrative is clearly only as an object of lust and desire, the temptation that the angel feels and the ultimate cause of his suffering. This is (unfortunately) standard in the world of art and photography, as explained in the beginning of this essay, and further illustrates how ground-breaking Woodman’s work was in presenting a different approach to the portrayal of female nudity and femininity in general.
CONCLUSION-
“Woodman’s linking of the woman´s body to the walls and surfaces it seems bonded to repeats the theme of the body as itself a surface.”
Abigail Solomon-Godeau, (1986) “Just Like A Woman”, published in: Photographic Work
In essence, Woodman’s exploration of her own femininity feels almost like an attack on the stereotypical perception of femininity expected from a teenage girl, in that she is open and confident about her nude body without fetishising or overly-sexualising it in the way that many of her male contemporaries were doing at the time, the way her influences had done before, and in the way that (especially male) artists and photographers have continued to do since her death. She photographs her body within almost exclusively abandoned and dilapidated spaces in a Gothic-like manner, which on the surface reduces it’s perceived “worth” but in actuality elevates her message and the emotions she conveys to even higher platforms. Although she never credited many, if any, other photographers and artists as direct influences on her art, but the few she has can clearly be seen throughout her whole body of work. For example, the extended metaphor of angels and general angelic imagery can be attributed to Duane Michals, and she has often been grouped within the Surrealist art movement as a result of the often strange and eerie tone we get from her photographs. Her age is also an impactful factor on her perception of femininity and how she represents her sexuality, as youth often sees the subjects of sex and gender identity as far more fluid and questioning than older generations tend to. In my opinion, her continued use of the nude female body is one of the most important components when evaluating how she explores femininity, because she completely subverts the traditional expectations of a passive, naïve, yet somehow intensely sexual woman, and replaces it with this image of a person who is at the same time shy and confident, trapped and free, and, to a degree, mocking the viewer’s shock at these unexpected sights.
BIBLIOGRAPHY-
Butler, J. (2011) Your Behaviour Creates Your Gender.
Mulvey, L. (1975) Visual Pleasures. Screen
Niedda, M. (2020). Feminist and queer studies: Judith Butler’s conceptualisation of gender.
Solomon-Godeau, A. (1986) Just Like A Woman. Photographic Work
Townsend, C. (2006) Francesca Woodman: Scattered in Space and Time). London: Phaidon Press Ltd
In what way does the work of Francesca Woodman explore the concepts of femininity and sexuality ?
main points-
INTRO: femininity has been explored in different ways throughout history, idea of gender identity is linked to sexuality for many people, Woodman links these concepts to other artists as well as portraying her own representation
PARA 1: women are often portrayed as sexual objects, Judith Butler’s work on gender roles/the disconnect between sex and gender, gender as a social construct/performance, use of androgyny in photography reflecting this, LINK TO SURREALISM
PARA 2: woodman in relation to femininity, the way she uses herself and her nude body in a sort-of desexualising way/ feels less like voyeurism and more like exploration, gender expression and self identity as fluid concepts, link to Woodman’s young age and how it could just be an example of her experimentation, long exposure as an artistic technique, ANALYSIS OF IMAGES
PARA 3: linking woodman to another artist (duane michals), michals’ use of long exposure and narrative sequencing, COMPARE AND CONTRAST TWO ARTIST IMAGES, use angel series for comparison
PARA 4: woodman’s fight against stereotypical femininity, link to other influences, use of space/abandoned buildings (sense of value), her youth as impactful on her perception of identity/sexuality/gender,
(possible) quotes-
“Woodman’s photographs show a subject poised between presence and absence, where the body seems to hesitate in its visibility and identity.” Townsend C, 2006, “Francesca Woodman: Scattered in Space and Time“
“sex is not the biological meaning of gender and is socially constructed by norms, just as gender is an ongoing performance” (Marilou Niedda, 2020;1)
Simone de Beauvoir in her book The Second Sex (1949), “one is not born but rather becomes a woman,”
“in their traditional exhibitionist role women are simultaneously looked at and displayed” (Mulvey 1975:19)
“In 1986 Abigail Solomon-Godeau presented Woodman as a prodigy who could be understood as critiquing the historical and linguistic construction of femininity and trying to produce an essentially feminist aesthetic” (Townsend 2006)
“Woodman’s linking of the woman´s body to the walls and surfaces it seems bonded to repeats the theme of the body as itself a surface.” Abigail Solomon-Godeau, (1986) “Just Like A Woman”, published in: Photographic Work
Firstly I uploaded all the footage for this scene and lay them out roughly – resizing, cutting appropriate frames and rendering all videos.
I then had lots of short videos of phone alarms, so cut these together with the first transitional frame being slightly longer, and the rest following a quick paced time-lapse style sequence.
I then layered a continuous audio of the phone alarm across these short clips, as well as before (to transition into the sequence) and after to show a continuation. I then used an exponential fade to slowly blend out the alarm.
I then found and imported an email notification sound effect, and layered it an appropriate time with the video.
With the archived summer videos, i had them playing on the screen and used transitional fades to layer and switch between the multiple videos
Next i imported the audio from the original videos, and used these to layer in sequence with the videos on the screen (removing the videos own audio). I adjusted these to a lower volume and used continual fade transitions to continue through one video to the next. For one clip specifically i cut up and re adjusted the audio as it had a flaw (loud shout in the background i didn’t want to include) and used fades between the cut audio to have them smooth, and make it unnoticeable that the audio had been edited.
Lastly i continued the last videos audio slightly into the next clip, and used a constant gain transition at the beginning of the shown transitional to bring in and set up the music for the next scene
