At this moment in time I aim to create a film in lieu of a photography book because, as a amateur film maker and considering film is what I want to study at university, it is the most obvious outcome for me to make. I plan to focus on the topic of Island Identity and zoom in on the subtopic of Community with a focus on cultural food. This is a subject I have explored in a past project but not with the detail I plan to have in this one. I intend to accomplish this in a documentary style, reminiscent of media channels such as insider, BuzzFeed and As/Is who often create similar content to educate people on what food looks like around the world. To stay within the brief of Island Identity I intend to only film people who live in Jersey. I plan to feature at least five different nationalities including Mexican, Polish and Portuguese to show the range of people from different cultures who now reside in Jersey. To ensure differing opinions and responses I endeavour to use different age groups when filming and ultimately plan to have a range between those in their teenage years to much older people, some being in their 70s and 80s. Instead of focusing completely on the end result of food I want to interview different people about how this particular dish has effected them personally and the importance of it to them. I think food is very significant in regards to socio-economic factors and can tell a lot about ones upbringing and social life, working as a bridge to preserve knowledge and connect older and younger generations.
Photo taken from a insider video showcasing different school lunch meals around the world
For this project, I want to focus on the theme of identity, and display my identity in a deeper sense. I want to show how my life has changed based on events that have happened in my life so far and how they have shaped me into who I am today. I also want to show how my family have influenced me throughout my life, and how different parts of my personality are shaped from them. This idea is important to me because it explains how events in my life have affected me and is more personal than other work I have made before. I think presenting my life through photos also leaves an aspect of ambiguity to anyone else, as the photos without context allow for alternate viewpoints of meaning. I want to develop this project into a photobook, as I didn’t find making films as interesting as making a physical piece. I feel like making a photobook would be more interesting because I can alter the images as well as the physical pages, which adds another level of personalisation. I may begin my study by looking through family albums to get more of a sense of my life when I was younger, and especially the times that I don’t remember. As I have lived in the same house surrounded by my family all my life, I could take my images in my house or my neighbourhood, as it is a big part of my life. I enjoyed making one of my final projects in year 12, influenced by the artist Carolle Benitah, so I may do something similar for this project. Since my family has a very interesting and extended heritage, I want to include aspects of this too. I may write about Lillie Langtry, who’s maiden name was Lillie Le Breton, or Fletcher Christian who was a mutineer on the HMS Bounty and a relative on my grandmothers side of the family. I want to do more research on these figures and maybe work out direct relations and asking older relatives in my family about these topics.
In a past blog post I focused on the idea of happiness and mental health as this photographer had suffered from depression and anxiety. I always found his work beautiful as you can feel his emotions through his physicality rather than his facial expressions. I enjoyed doing this project as I used an old photo to cut up and rearrange in a new order to show chaos in a simple photo by collaging the new cut up pieces.
Edward Honaker is a a 21 year old photographer who documents his own depression through the use of self portraits, the black and white images illustrates the photographer’s experience with depression and anxiety. In an attempt to raise awareness of the topic, Honaker says about the project: “Mental health disorders are such a taboo topic. If you ever bring it up in conversation, people awkwardly get silent, or try to tell you why it’s not a real problem. When I was in the worst parts of depression, the most helpful thing anyone could have done was to just listen to me – not judging, not trying to find a solution, just listen. I’m hoping that these images will help open up conversation about mental health issues. Everyone is or will be affected by them one way or another, and ignoring them doesn’t make things better.”
With this photographer I enjoyed the timing of the photos by slowing down the shutter speed but still being able to find the right timing to move the mask so it wasn’t so blurry that it is just a white dot or too slow that you can still see the persons face. the use of masks was very interesting and I found was very affective as he uses a lot of masks but if I was to use this photographer I would try find doll masks to use to give a rustic atmosphere to the images.
Before
Keld Helmer-Petersen was a Danish photographer who was inspired by Albert Renger-Patzsch. He became famous through his colour photographs but he also published several books of black and white images that explore dramatic contrasts of tone. Some of these photos were only black and white without any tones as they had been removed. Helmer-Petersen published his first photobook, “122 Colour Photographs” in 1948. His work was then noticed for its inventive photos, which he turned landscapes and buildings into abstract patterns. He embraced coloured photos as black and white photos were only seen as being serious.
This was another photographer that I enjoyed interpreting as the use of extreme black and white as I felt was very effective as the two colours are very contrasting and I did find editing the images enjoyable but it was difficult to find images that was easy to have a great depth of contrast so would be needing images with solid colour which I found difficult with the sky as the layers of clouds made it difficult but with the images I chose after testing out the editing, I feel worked really well with the editing and the outcome.
While mind mapping ideas for my personal project I focused on the seven aspects of the Island Identity project to give me a clear focus and not get distracted from the main idea. I used some points taken from our class posters such as the Siam cup and jersey as a tax haven however the idea I want to further study is the diverse food in migrant communities. I briefly touched upon this topic hen creating a zine however I only explored traditionally jersey food such as les pais au fou (Jersey bean crock) In this project I want to explore this more in depth, celebrating the culture of our many migrant communities and educating myself along the way.
To create my mood board I found many photos online of cultural food and people eating it. Most of the images I found were predominantly Asian whilst the demographic for my project will be mainly Europeans since that is he highest demographic in Jersey. Whilst searching for images I came across the work of MAGDA ADAMCZAK whose photos really resonated with me and my idea for what I want to do for my own project.
Photo by Magda Adamczak- displayed on the national geographic magazine
Mind-map of the theme of Identity , to help with my personal study;
MOOD BOARD-
By doing a small research task on The Island Identity, this has allowed me to understand what makes Jersey unique and the important factors that make up Jersey for what it is, it’s identity. This has allowed me to think about my personal study and how I wan to do it on something that’s important to me and identifies me as an individual.
Here I have explored certain ideas that relate to the theme of identity, touching on subjects that I found interesting whilst studying the topic of Identity and Community in year 12 and 13. This allowed me to list any sub-topics I could go into within these categories and enabled me to think of ways I could link this to my personal identity. I am particularly interested in developing my knowledge of my family background through photography and collage. With this the subject of lineage or family would work best as it would allow me to explore some elements of childhood and regional backgrounds within it.
This mood board I have compiled includes photographs that relate to the four subjects stated in my mind map, with quite a few using multiple mediums to create one image, something I would like to experiment with and incorporate within my own work. The images I found especially interesting from researching these types of photography, were created by artist Clarissa Sligh who creates collages from her old family photographs to reshape the past in one of her projects, similarly to Carole Benitah.
From your Personal Investigation based on IDENTITY & COMMUNITY write an overview of what you learned so far (both as Yr 12 and Yr 13 student) and how you intend to develop your Personal Study.
1. Describe which themes, medium (photography, film), approaches (documentary, tableaux, conceptual), artists (incl contextual references to art history, movements and isms) and photographic skills, processes, techniques and methods (incl learning new software) inspired you the most and why.
themes of family and culture were the most important to me , we have explored this a lot through our subtopic of identity an community. I prefer to use the medium of film as its what I am most comfortable with making and also allows me to express my work more clearly by using music and visual effects. I really like the work of Vin and Omi who I studied when doing my most recent mock exam. As fashion designers they are not who I would usually gain inspiration for artist reference from however the clothes they make really resonated with my ideas of fast fashion. I loved how brightly coloured this project was as it really stood out from previously black and white or low mood photography which I felt allowed me to have much more creative control and more experimentation. Throughout my A level course my photography skills have progressed as I came onto the course with no skills in photography and could barely take a picture. Although I have massively improved I am still cautious with trying new photography techniques and rely heavily on automated settings on my camera. I hope to use this personal project as an excuse to learn more about my camera and move to a more advanced level of photography.
2. Include examples of both previous and current experiments and imagery to illustrate your thinking
The first big independent study of photography I had was my photography mock focusing on the theme, ‘identity and place’. Before this project I would not take many photo’s when out on a shoot which left my contact sheets lacking in images which resulted in me having limited choice in editing which in turn made my projects not so good. This was the first time I took lots of photos so I had plenty to choose from, allowing me to make my best final project at the time. This taught me the importance of taking an abundance of photos as well as showing me the difference it can make when there is lots of choice. The project also allowed me to obtain more skills in photoshop which I was, at the time, struggling with.
One of my family outcomes from the brief IDENTITY AND PLACE. My photos were influenced by eating disorders and the work of Laia Abril
After this project as completed I was interested in editing my images further outside of the brief. I used lightroom to create a multicoloured montage that I used to try and emulated both Andy Warhol and the 2000s pop movement
A creative experiment made using leftover images from my first identity mock
Out of this small mini-project this was my favourite final image. It may in fact be my favourite image I have created throughout my entire photography course. I love how the bright yellow has created a synthetic almost latex effect reminiscent of Britney Spears outfit from the music video of ‘Oops I did it again’
The outfit that reminded me of my photo- taken from the music video of ‘Oops I did it again’ Britney Spears
Doing creative projects like this has reaffirmed my love of brightly coloured photography which I continue in other subjects such as Media and Film Studies as well as having a firm link into pop culture which I also love.
During year 12 we explored many different topics and did many different projects. We looked at themes such as Anthropocene , street photography , portraiture abstract and many more. This has allowed me to be able to find out how the themes I enjoy photographing the most as I have been able to try many themes and now in year 13 I know where my strengths are and where I can focus on project on. We also experimented with many different skills in photography for example different lighting techniques and using artificial and natural lighting and creating a film. Over the photography course I have mainly enjoyed focusing on the portraiture and object based shoots. I enjoyed shoots in the studio where I use artificial lighting and set up the shoot rather than using a more natural setting. I feel my strengths are within portraiture photography as I like being able to control my shoots and set up the lighting rather than having to work around a set up. I like portraiture photography as I like being able to express peoples emotions in a powerful image as I feel this creates a good image and can give the viewers a message and can be open for interpretation.
I particularly liked this shoot as I enjoyed experimenting with different colours whether that’s red , blue or even black & white. I liked being able to create a contrast of colours as this can create a message for the viewers and I feel it creates a strong image. I was very happy with my final outcomes from this shoot and felt I created some good images.
I thoroughly enjoyed the identity shoot and project we did. I took portrait images and then cut out facial features, burned the eyes of the image and ripped or cut the image in order to adapt the image and create a new feel from the image. I enjoyed playing around with the image and being able to change and manipulate the image as I feel it completely changes the meaning of the image and makes it a more interesting image to look at. For this shoot I looked into the artist “Rosanna Jones” who was London photographer who specialises in a blend experimental blend of art and photography and celebrates the possibilities with an image. She is known for ripping up, painting over and destroying images. Her work is aimed at examining visual identity and notions of embodiment. I wanted to use her as I liked her style of work and her reasoning behind it. I feel like I could do so much and had lots of ideas and felt like this allowed me to be very creative.
These images were my final images from my Anthropocene project. In this project I used items which are seen as harmful to the environment and cause world wide issues for the global warming. I enjoyed experiment with using objects within my images to help adapt and enhance the portrait image. I was able to use these objects to change the view, visibility and concept behind the images.
Although my main preference within photography was portraiture photography I still explored landscape photography.
These images are from my street photography project where I went out into St Helier and photographed people without their knowledge of me taking the image in order to capture a real time image which is not staged.
My projects central focus will be around the complex idea of identity. I want to explore this theme through emotional and aesthetically consistent imagery and videography. I am going to hone in on something close to me to explore the idea of identity. I want to examine the sport of rugby. I have been playing rugby for Jerseys rugby team for a number of years and have been playing the sport since a young child which will give my project the aspect of an insider documentation. I want to explore how a team conducts themselves as a whole and the notion of finding identity within a team.
Jersey Reds mini rugby coaching Sunday session
Picture: MIKE KENEALY
However the main focal point of my project will hone in on one person to explore their identity. In this way I want to focus on the idea of identity in terms of ideologies of masculinity and also the idea of escapism. I believe this is important to explore; growing up rugby has always been a sport that carries with it many stereotypical notions. I believe rugby carries pride, patriotism, brotherhood and endurance within it. It was always a measure of toughness and strength. Two elements that are held in high value. However, these notions can loose their value when seen from the wrong perspective. Often these ideas associated with rugby can mutate into very toxic pressures placed on individual players. Hypermasculinity can have quite a negative effect when talking about identity. With my project I want to explore a rugby player who resembles the stereotypical Viking-like nature of rugby players and strip the ideological walls down and explore a real identity not just the face value aspect of ones identity. I have already began collecting images that represent begin to explore this idea.
