Comparisons of Cahuns and Hargreaves work

Sans titre, 1939
Claude Cahun
Plastic Paper - Henry Hargreaves ☻ Photographer
Henry Hargreaves

Comparing Claude Cahun’s work and Henry Hargreaves there is a clear difference in their photography styles. Claude Cahun’s style is full of darker, grey and black tones to create shadows and then uses lighting to create a distinct highlight upon the photo to be able to show you the message they are trying to create for the people who see it. On the other hand, Henry Hargreaves uses brighter, contrasting colours within his work to make it stand out with a deep meaning, as text can accompany a lot of his photography highlighting what the photo is about. Although he will also have that light hearted, comfortable atmospheric feeling to his photography to relay a message towards people but still keep a serious tone attached to it. The top picture is from the photographer Claude Cahun, in my opinion I think that it highlights the meaning of how all races/genders are able to come together and support each other in any way possible. It can also show how the prejudice ideas and stereotypes of different races/genders are able to be pushed past, which is mostly true this current day and age, and how it doesn’t matter what gender, age, sexuality or race someone may be because it doesn’t change how they should be perceived based on a stereotypical idea. Therefore, Henry Hargreaves work shows a different message where he highlights the importance of plastic pollution and what it is doing to the earth. The yellow colour, in the background, and red colour, of the plastic bags writing, is used to represent the dangers of pollution and how damaging the plastic bags can be to the wildlife. The words ‘Thank you’ which are repeated on it continuously can also be taken in a horrible way where the plastic bag is almost thanking you for letting it free and contributi8ng it towards pollution which makes you consider what your actions are contributing too and how much of a difference it would make to change to reusable bags instead.

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