“The pictures are of a psychological culture, a Jungian culture, if you will. It emanates from my own psyche… It’s a hard place to get to, honestly. It has taken me many years to get to that place and to define it visually.” – Roger Ballen

Self discovery is “the act or process of gaining knowledge or understanding of your abilities, character, and feelings”[1] according to the Britannica Dictionary. I think it takes much more than knowing what your hobbies are and what clothes you like wearing. Discovering yourself means reaching to the deep, dark parts of your subconscious and meeting all the “socially unacceptable” parts of the Being you have repressed throughout your life. As Jordan Peterson described in his book 12 Rules for Life, An Antidote to Chaos, “Being is what each of us experiences, subjectively, personally and individually, as well as what we each experience jointly with others. As such, it includes emotions, drivers, dreams, visions and revelations, as well as our private thought and perceptions.’ Peterson expands on the point by stating: ‘Being is also, finally, something that is brought into existence by action, so it’s nature is to an indeterminate degree a consequence of our decisions and choices – something shaped by our hypothetically free will”. [2] It can be a dreadful and terrifying process as you start to uncover your true capacity for destruction and chaos alas it is the only path to serenity and order. Roger Ballen explores the theme of self discovery through his subconscious, the very dark places in his psyche which hold all the repressed emotions and drivers behind choice and decision, places to which the conscious does not have access to. Psyche refers to the complete personality of the individual. In response to Ballen’s work I will produce a photobook exploring the theme of self discovery through my lived experiences. I am aiming to show all the dark and uncomfortable parts of the human psyche, through a series of images where I am staging lived experiences creating a narrative between fact and fiction.

Carl Jung was a Swiss psychologist who aimed to understand the nature of the psyche and develop strategies in order to integrate its components into a state of wholeness. “Mans task, is… to become conscious of the contents that press upward from the unconscious… As for as we can discern, the sole purpose of human existence is to kindle the light in the darkness of mere being” [3]. However most of the interaction between the two happen beyond our awareness and control, hence a big part of who we are, what we are capable of and the drivers behind our actions and choices, exists beyond our reach or understanding. Individuation is the achievement of self actualisation through the process of integrating the conscious and the unconscious[4].

Jung’s model of the psyche consists of the consciousness, personal unconsciousness and the collective unconsciousness. Consciousness refers to a “realm of personal awareness where one identifies explicitly and knowingly with themselves”.[5] In the centre of the consciousness Jung identified a structure called the ego, which is responsible for creating stories about oneself told to oneself as a way of providing a sense of personal distinction. The ego is expressed as a persona or the appearance an individual displays to the world. However the persona is often far from one’s true self as the ego only allows qualities deemed acceptable or appropriate in society. The ego filters elements of our experiences and characteristics either into or away from the consciousness. The personal unconscious is an idea well understood through Freud’s work. It is a place beyond our awareness where we store all the repressed aspects of selfhood, which continue to interact with the conscious. The collective unconscious, according to Jung is a collection of universal elements originating in the inherited structure of the brain. He has observed patterns and characteristics throughout myths, religions and cultures of communities unlikely to contact each other yet their stories centre around the same roles and elements. He called those universal, inherited, themes and motifs the archetypes. The archetypes are the base for personality, influencing the individuals cognitive tendencies. In the combined unconscious, Jung referred to the repressed parts of selfhood the ego does not want to identify with, as the shadow. More specifically Jung identified within the shadow the animus and anima. Animus meaning the suppressed masculine qualities (Strength, logic, leadership, action…) in a female and anima referring to the suppressed feminine qualities in a man (Creativity, nurture, empathy, grace). All those structures are supposed to work together in circulation, mediating between one another in order to achieve balance and create the Self. The Self refers to who an individual truly is, what they like, desire, what they are capable of. Individualisation is a process that requires radical self honesty and actively working toward true self acceptance. There is no way to separate an individual form its psychological shadow, nor should we try to do so by denying and repressing it. “Good does not become better by being exaggerated, but worse, and a small evil becomes a big one though being disregarded and repressed. The shadow is very much a part of human nature, and it is only at night that no shadow exists”. [6]

I have been deeply committed to the process of Individuation since I realised how lost I was in the persona I have fabricated to protect myself or maybe rather protect the outside world from my true flawed Self. The more I learned the more I understood that the emptiness and loneliness I felt wasn’t due to a lack of acceptance by others but rather a result of rejection of the Self. I learned that endlessly striving towards light takes away from the quality of being human and that rebelling against it completely, in order to satisfy desire (even if the desire is to protect oneself) brings you closer to being a monster than a human. As Jordan Peterson says “A harmless man is not a good man. A good man is a very, very dangerous man who has that under voluntary control”. In the same way I have found that there is order within chaos and chaos within order and that ambitiously striving for either one or the other can tip the balancing scales into insanity. In this project I aim to portray the balancing of order and chaos, the feminine and the masculine, the light and dark involved in the forever ongoing process of Individuation.

Roger Ballen

Roger Ballen evolved his style using a simple square format in stark and black and white. His earlier works shows clear connection to traditional documentary photography however it developed into a style described as documentary fiction, combining reality and hallucination. Throughout his carrier Ballen photographed people that could be described as outsiders who’s appearance was more of a physical manifestation of a psychological disturbance. When asked if he himself feels to be an outsider he described the complexity of his work. “I would say that I am not an outsider artist. I like art that reflects something very basic, very primitive and psychological, which has something in common with outsider art but the work itself is advanced photography.”[7] He explained how his photographs are staged scenes, intensified to the absurd as metaphors for the mind itself, including symbolic elements such as animals, drawings, organised chaos, broken objects and fragmented humans[8]. In essence Ballen explores the theme by taking a dive through the depths of his psyche and exploring all that constitutes a Being.

The Protector is one of the photographs from the series Roger the Rat which aims to visually explore the forces that shape the human psyche. In this quote Ballen describes who the main subject is. “I am an outsider, live on the margin and have no place in human society. I am judged by humanity to be insane, to be feared and avoided at all costs. Normality must be preserved; it is sacrosanct, no matter what the cost… Most humans hate people such as me, as we challenge their illusion of stability and purpose.” In this, Ballen manages to perfectly explain what a psychological shadow is, why we repress it and fear it. He continues to explain: “As a rat, I symbolise chaos and disorder. There is little hope of a better world until humanity comes to terms with the unpleasant fact that repression and fear are ultimately the masters of their destiny. I cannot remember when I put this rat mask on for the first time. Maybe I was born with it. I am not sure what is underneath. I never take it off: I sleep with it, bathe with it. I have heard people call me a rat and others a human with a mask. I am unsure whether I am a rat or human. Perhaps my mother was a rat and my father a human. I think I am a bit of both.” [9] Ballen explains that until humanity comes to terms with its shadow and starts to perceive the flawed and twisted as a part of our nature, there is no chance for unification. You cannot fix an issue until you see it.

In conclusion, Roger Ballen explores the theme of self discovery through the exploration of his psyche, in the process identified by Carl Jung as Individuation. This results in absurd photographs of a deep psychological nature. However, to what extent can we actually represent the subconscious though photography? Considering the topic is deeper than the ocean it self, I feel that parts of the subconscious cannot be perceived by vision alone. Maybe, there is parts of it we cannot perceive at all? Given our biological limitations. And even if, does the process of Individuation ever really finish? Do we get to a point where exploring is no longer an option? Or is our consciousness forever expanding just like the universe it self? Maybe we aren’t meant to know it all, maybe we should leave that up to God, after all isn’t sin (literal meaning in Hebrew to “miss the mark”) the one quality that makes us human?

Bibliography

[1]

Britannica Dictionary definition of SELF–DISCOVERY

[2]

Jordan Peterson, 12 Rules for Life, An Antidote to Chaos (2018) ch. 1

[3]

Carl Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections (1962) ch. 11

[4], [5]

Pursuit of Wonder, Becoming Your True Self – The Psychology of Carl Jung (YouTube)

[6]

Carl Jung, A Psychological Approach to the Dogma of the Trinity (1942), Psychology and Religion: West and East, pg. 286

[7], [8]

[9]

Roger Ballen: The Enigma of Organised Chaos, Alasdair Foster, 20 March 2021, Africa

Question: How does the work of Michael Marten and Gustave le Gray explore the sea and how it changes?

opening quote: (micheal marten sea change text) ‘His beautiful and surprising photographs reveal how the twice daily rhythm of ebb and flood can dramatically transform the landscape’

Introduction: The area of my study is looking at romanticism and coastal photography. I chose to study these two photographers because they make similar work, but in different time periods. This can show a contrast between the two artists while still focusing on the same subject. I will be responding to the question by using a comparative approach, and going into detail about how they took their photos. Also another intention of my study is to compare the photographers work to my own, and use examples of my own work next to theirs. This area of photography interests me because we live on an island and are surrounded by the sea. Also, Jersey has a tidal range of almost 12m, the third largest tidal range in the world. Because of this, the size difference of the island when the tide is in and out is huge. This tidal range is what I aim to show in my own photos. This project links to some of my previous studies as well, for example when I was photographing rock types, a lot of it was on the coast. On photoshop, I plan to experiment on photoshop to make the photos look as similar as possible, the only difference being the tide and the time the photo was taken. In Lightroom, I will experiment with changing the exposure and other settings only on part of the photo, for example the sky. I will also experiment with black and white images which I will be able to compare with the work of Gustave le Gray.

Pg 1 plan: Historical context: describe how coastal sceneries in landscape panting with reference to J.M. W Turner and his links with Romanticism (possibly discuss theory of the sublime)

Paragraph 1: The romanticism era lasted throughout the 19th century and it favoured depicting emotions such as trepidation, horror and nature. Many artists such as Joseph Mallord William Turner found they could express these emotions by painting coastal landscapes. His 1805 painting, ‘The Shipwreck’, was one of the most famous seascape works of the romanticism era. Disasters at sea were a recurring theme of this movement, and in this painting Turner clearly shows this.

The painting depicts the scene of ships in distress, with the white colours of the waves showing the rough conditions. The sky also shows emotion, with dark shades of grey contrasting the colours of the sea. You can see people on the ships, which could maybe be lifeboats from a bigger ship, but he did not state this. This leaves a lot to the imagination and adds a sense of mystery to the painting. Turner shows the dramatic trauma of a shipwreck well, using darker colours which were popular in his early work. These dark colours contrast with the white tops of the waves and the grey sky. One more romanticist painting he made was called ‘Three Seascapes’. This painting was more abstract and used an interesting technique which was showing 3 seascapes in one painting.

The painting was made to show 3 seascapes by flipping the top one around, so the sky serves for 2 of the sea parts if the canvas is flipped. Once again he contrasts the darker colours of the sea with the white crests of the waves. At the top, there is a much darker sea with no white crests. Turner might have made the third upside down seascape on top very different to the others because it stands out to the viewer when the canvas is flipped:

The black colours show the darkness of the sea, and creates a dramatic contrast between the sea and the sky.

paragraph 2: Coastal photography has been a popular genre ever since the first cameras were made. Gustave le Gray was a pioneer of this genre from the start. His photographic technique was called combination printing. Because of the limitations at the time, it was hard to capture the sea and the sky at the same time in one image. Le Gray countered this by putting together two negatives, one of the sea and one of the sky. This allowed him to create a tonal balance of the sea and the sky in the final print. He took his most dramatic seascape using this technique in 1857, called ‘the great wave’, on the Mediterranean coast near Montpellier.

NB:make sure you describe Le Gray’s photographic technique combination printing as precursor to exposure bracketing and HDR photography

This photo shows the aggression of the waves against the rocks and the pier in the distance, while also showing the horizon and how it contrasts the textures of the sea. The clouds are cut off at the horizon where they meet the sea, which indicates the join between the two negatives. Gustave aimed to combine images to show how the human eye sees nature, not through a camera. This is something I aimed for in my project. This area of photography links to the art movement called romanticism. Romanticism aims to show the accurate depiction of lifeforms, landscapes and perspective of colour and light. It also aims to steer away from artificiality. This movement links to my work as well because in my project I aimed to show natural images of the sea and the sky in the same spot 6 hours apart, with little artificiality.

I took this photo in Brighton as the sun was rising. The photography culture in this city is mainly focused on the sea, and it has been one of the best places to take coastal photos in the UK ever since the genre became popular. My photo is similar to Gustave le Gray’s as it shows the contrast between the sea and the sky and clouds, while also showing the horizon and a pier in the distance. An indication of modernism in my photo compared to Gustave’s, is the vertical pier called the i360 on the left. This shows the 166 year contrast between the photos clearly. In this photo I also tried to show a contrast between the old and abandoned pier on the left which burnt down in 2003, the second pier in the distance which was built in 1899 and is still open, and the vertical i360 on the left which was built in 2016. I captured all 3 in one photo because I wanted to show history and modernism in one photo, whilst also getting the sea and the sky.

Paragraph 3: Michael Marten’s project ‘sea change’ was made to show the contrast between the tide when it was in and out in different areas around England. He would take 2 photos from the exact same spot at low tide and high tide. This inspired me to create my own version in Jersey, as the tidal range here is 12m, the third largest tidal range in the world. In England it’s only 2-5m.

This is a map of Jersey’s tidal range, with the blue parts showing cliff edges with deep sea and the yellow showing bays with intertidal flats and reefs. For my project, I focused on the bottom right yellow area of Jersey as this area has the biggest tidal range. I took photos at La Rocque and Green Island, but most of my photos were in the La Rocque area as there is a pier and views of the next bays over on the left.

An example of Michael Marten’s sea change work:

Some examples of my work at La Rocque:

I took my photos by placing down three pieces of tape at low tide where I chose to position my tripod, and returning 6 hours later at high tide to take a photo in the same spot. By putting the two photos next to each over it shows the viewer how a coastal landscape can change in a matter of hours. This is a quote taken from the text of Michael Marten’s ‘Sea Change’ photobook:

‘One aspect of what makes these photographs so compelling is the fascination of comparing each pair of pictures, spotting what has or hasn’t changed. The contrasting views play with our sense of depth and perspective, and show how subjective is our perception of landscape. The result is a substantial document capturing the variety of the British coastline, a portrait of the maritime landscape that makes visible in a dramatic new way the ebb and flow of tidal waters.’

This is exactly what I aimed for when taking my photos. The fact that Jersey’s tidal range is so big made me think how the same idea could be replicated here to show the uniqueness of the island I live on.

 In conclusion, I think Gustave le Gray, Michael Marten and Joseph Mallord William Turner all show romanticism, seascapes and how the sea changes well in their own unique ways. Gustave le Gray invented a technique which was very innovative in the history of seascapes. His work paved the path for the photographers of the next generation to carry on taking photos of the sea. Michael Marten used his unique idea of photographing tidal changes to create a photobook which inspired me to make my own.

However, all three systems are reliant on an element of construction and re-construction. Photographs can be reliable, but can also be manipulated to tell another version of “the truth”. The Romanticists were interested in capturing elements of the The Sublime and dramatizing events and conditions. But Michael Marten is different. He has incorporated aspects of British culture into his documentary of our coastline, as there is a national fascination with both the weather and the tides. As an island nation, and Jersey being a small inter-connected island we are familiar with these kinds of viewpoints and feel a sensitivity towards  seascapes and the communities that rely on the seas too.

‘From holiday beaches to industrial estuaries, the photographs record two moments in time, two states of nature.’

Narrative: What is your story?
Describe in:

• 3 words:

Comfort, adventure, nature

• A sentence:

Follow the path of the many beautiful places which are found throughout Jersey, you’ll never know what you might find.

• A paragraph:

Jersey holds many different pathways for you to explore. There are so many different valleys, woods, trails for you to go and see. It provides you with a sense of comfort and tranquillity as the chirping of the birds fills the air and the rushing of the water flowing by in a stream guides you throughout.

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Design: Consider the following…

• How you want your book to look and feel:

Portrait, sleek, smooth.

• Paper, ink, format, size and orientation:

Shiny paper, a small amount of text throughout which discusses the journey that the photobook takes you on when you see the various naturistic landscapes of Jersey.

• Binding and cover:

Hard cover.

• Title:

Unsure of title.

• Design and layout:

To have a page which is blank every couple of pages, alternate between having a couple of black and white pictures to colour, make sure that an image of a person/animal appears every 4-5 pages to create a story.

• Editing and sequencing:

Black and white and colour, pair most images up, leave a few for single paged images and full page spreads.

• Text:

Have a small amount of text included to provide a story throughout the book, do not overload it, keep it short and simple.

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Mood board –

This is my mood board which is compromised of images of different layouts and covers that resemble the theme of nature and weather photography as that is the theme for my photobook. I really liked full page spreads or spreads with photos that correlate together on each side but I will also incorporate single page spreads as well within my photobook for photos which work well as stand alone images.

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Contact sheets

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The aim for this photshoot was to create 3 or 4 pieces inspired by Michael Marten, and capture the changing of the tide in the harbour of Gorey. I used photos of my tripod positioning to get the same angles and framing for both pictures as shown below.

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Selections

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“Youth culture refers to the societal norms of children, adolescents, and young adults… distinct from those of adults in the community.” (Wikipedia: 2022)

Actions and attitudes, styles and behaviours, music, and beliefs, are all factors which make up ‘Youth Culture’. Similar to animals, youth tend to be reckless and stick together in pacts where they feel most comfortable, accepted, and familiar. Young adults, differ from adults in the sense where they don’t take things so seriously, they’re brains are still mouldable, they tend to be quite ‘careless’, they are free. I have chosen this area of research because as a teen in Jersey, I am aware of the struggles and hardships we face living on a small island where we often feel trapped and suffocated, with little places to go and a lack of new things to see. The pressure we are faced with living in such a small community, where everyone knows everyone and everyone’s business. Justine Kurland and Ryan McGinley both capture youth culture in ways of rebelling against their countries, Kurland focussing on escaping this idea of ‘The American Dream’ and McGinley on rebelling the governing law. The two photographers capture youth culture in vastly diverse ways, Kurland’s, being soft and fairy tale-like while McGinley’s displays a much grittier, and rougher lifestyle. In this essay, I intend to create an understanding of Justine Kurland’s work from her book ‘Girl Pictures’, I also intend to compare and discuss the work of Ryan McGinley’s ‘The Kids Were Alright’

Abigail Solomon Godeau, a famous writer and postmodern critic, discussed what she refers to as the inside/outside positions which photographers can take when photographing their subjects. The binary opposing views of inside/out is at the heart of Godeau discussion. An outside perspective may come across as: voyeuristic, objectifying, distant, alienated/alienating, touristic, unsympathetic. On the other hand; an inside perspective: privileged, intimate, trusting, sympathetic/empathic, engaged, participatory. Godeau refers to a criticism by Susan Sontag in relation to the work of Diane Arbus, within the criticism, Sontag states that because Arbus has an outside perspective the involvement becomes unsympathetic, objectifying, and voyeuristic. Susan Sontag argued that certain forms of photographic depiction were especially complicit with processes of objectification that precluded either empathy or identification “Arbus was indicted as a voyeuristic and deeply morbid connoisseur of the horrible.”- (Solomon-Godeau year: pg no). Seemingly, it means that an outside position when photographing a subject is wrong on moral terms and an inside position is good “engagement, participation and privileged knowledge.”. Ultimately, Godeau’s aim was to find or create a sense of truth towards photography.

Justine Kurland, a runaway, was born in Warsaw, New York 1969, Kurland is known for capturing utopian landscapes and communities which often have a sense of going against the American dream. I was heavily drawn in by her book ‘Girls Pictures’, in which we are introduced to utopic feminist alternative to the American existence. Within the book we are introduced to a group of girls travelling through the different seasons and terrains of America, ‘runaways’. ‘I don’t know any of the girls in Justine Kurland’s Girl Pictures, but it really feels like I do. Or at least, I must have seen them. Maybe they were there on the side of the highway, or in some public restroom, or just standing on a sidewalk as I passed by. The girls in their baggy jeans and bare feet. The girls in their leather boots and used sweaters. There’s something about them that feels like so many teenage girls. The images in this book weigh me down with a sense of nostalgia, and it’s not just the late nineties fashion. It’s the fact that the girls seem to be disappearing. Like catching a wild animal in a trap, it feels like by the time you look at each image of these girls you’ve already missed them. They’ve run off to someplace better or just some place that isn’t here.’ (reference using Harvard) I was intrigued by Kurland work, I found a huge sense of personal familiarity within her pictures which I feel relate to the youth of Jersey so perfectly, the need to escape, to discover the unknown, fleeing the nest in which we often feel trapped, suffocated.

‘Girls pictures’ is a source of fantasy escapism which captures a sentiment and desire in which a lot of youth desire. The images tell the story of teenage girls who are runaways while living in the periphery of American life, wild yet still in ways dystopically connected to humanity through roadways, drainpipes, overpasses, buildings, and cars. It does become clear to see that the images are constructed however the images hold an energy which seems candid. The images creating an overwhelming alluring sense of freedom as well as a sense of ‘sisterhood’, brought on by the continuous theme of pacts, it is rare to see an image of a girl alone. Kurland, as a young girl, was too a runaway. Her past life experiences give Kurland an inside perspective on the nature of the subjects making the images authentic although constructed. However, Kurland was an adult at the time she had taken these images she also does have an outside perspective. How did she know the youth then was the same as when she was a young runaway? Was it genuine?

The construction of Kurland’s images is fascinating, not only do the images feel nostalgic, from the early 2000’s wardrobe and the sense of carefree silliness. Kurland’s images reference the style of the spirited tableaus reminiscent of rococo art which originated in France in the early 18th century which depicted middle class youth embracing nature through play, often captured in pastel colours. Rococo art also captures art in a constructed yet candid way as if they were trying to capture a lively moment. The freedom within this art translates directly to Kurland’s work, through her use of capturing images in a soft light on overcast days or early morning rather than the beaming midday American sun. Kurland has also referred to Arthur Rackham, an English illustrator known for his depictions on fairy tales as a source of inspiration for the project, giving the photo collection a huge sense of a story book. Rackham’s illustrations feature characters embracing and connected with nature in a playful sense. Kurland’s image ‘The Bathers’ allude to a history of paintings under the same title such as Cezanne’s ‘The Large Bathers’.

Kurland’s images are almost cinematic and create a narrative from a single image, a popular theme in 90s photography, also seen with photographers such as Jeff Wall and Gregory Crewdson, two photographers in which Kurland studied during her time at Yale. Kurland’s images favour wide, horizontal frames which almost seem as if they are stills from a film, they allow the imagination to imagine a story, when being compared to images from someone like Gregory Crewdson, seem a lot more real from her skill in disguising the construction and from that we are pulled so deeply into the story of her characters and their lives creating less of an establishment and more of an emotional feeling.

This image is called ‘Puppy Love, fire for sale’, the first thing I notice when I see this image, similar to many others by Kurland, is the abolishment of gender stereotypes. The image features girls in clothes which differ from skirts and dresses, they are seen in dirty denim and relaxed hair. The fire pit pouring with flames could be a metaphor for the fire and drive which is keeping these runaways going. The makeshift tents show that the girls, although young, can take care of themselves. The pink and blue tents seemed to be split apart, this could perhaps represent the social split between boys and girls in a metaphorical meaning or perhaps in a literary sense as this is a girls only adventure. The girl wrapped in a blanket in the background of the image makes me want to know where she has been: collecting wood for the fire? Sourcing berries?… The focal image of the image is the fire pit, which leads our eyes to the tired looking girls surrounding it perhaps suggesting they have had a day of adventure. The lighting is soft and seems to be early evening, the vibrant orange laying onto the girls skin highlight their energy and optimism. It could be said that in this photo Kurland has an outside perspective as she is older, she may not feel the possible fear or unease that the girls are feeling, while the girls are sleeping in their makeshift tents, will she be sleeping in her van? However, following back up with Kurland’s past of being a runaway, she probably knows exactly how it feels to be sleeping in an open place with minimal shelter.

Ryan McGinley, an American photographer, began his journey in New York City in 1998. McGinley’s work on ‘The kids were alright’ features photographs and polaroid’s of youth in New York City in the late 90s with a documentary approach. McGinley creates a powerful portrait of his generation, from representation of their debauched lifestyles in a gritty, rebellious, and daring way often focussing on moments of both pleasure and pain, fun, and boredom. The kids were alright exploring McGinley and his friends in states of varying nudity, ecstasy, and Reckless abandon. McGinley has a vast inside perspective on this project, some of his images being taken as a way of him remembering what he had done that evening when he woke up the next day, we are seeing an almost authentic and real intake of 90s New York youth.

McGinley uses a post-modern approach to his work, Postmodernism was the collective name given to the shattering of modernism. In photography this was the direct challenge to the ideal of fine art photography whose values were established on an anti-commercial stance. McGinley really approached the insider perspective with depth, allowing us in on events such as moments shared with his first boyfriend, giving us a much more intimate and possessive view of his life through his work. McGinley’s work holds a huge sense of freedom and living in the moment, Dash Snow, a multimedia artist who covers the drug fuelled anarchy of New York life commented ‘People fall in love with McGinley’s work because it tells a story about liberation and hedonism’ (reference using Harvard). ‘The Kids were Alright’ beautifully captures the raw fun and emotion of youth, it embodies the prevalence of an unspoken sex culture as well as diving into the gay and queer culture In New York, something seemingly lost and hidden due to the HIV hysteria. McGinley captured the weird and unwashed, the bloody and the truth.

This image by Ryan McGinley, show the subject holding two bags of seemingly narcotics over his eyes, his could suggest that the influence of drugs is all around him, being shoved in his face through television, music, the media and from general surroundings. This could also suggest, drug culture, which links with sub cultures such as youth and sex culture, two cultures which McGinley covers. These young people are chasing a high, states of ecstasy perhaps to escape the depression and calamity surrounding them with the AIDS virus. The boys T-Shirt displays some sort of mockery towards the police, perhaps suggesting the ACAB movement. This picture seems exciting, the boy is wearing his bag suggesting that they are about to go somewhere or just arriving somewhere. Where are they going

In conclusion, Ryan McGinley and Justine Kurland represented youth culture from an inside perspective, focussing on familiarity and personal experiences. Justine Kurland fairy-tale like photos ultimately being a representation of her past as a young runaway while also expressing her views and hatred of the American Dream. Ryan McGinley used his current place in life in a documentary way to capture the rebellious fun as well as a portal to express his emotions as a young gay may in the midst of the AIDS virus while just wanting to be young and free. Within my own work, i attempted to capture moments of careless fun e.g. hanging out with my friends, I also included images which I had taken at festivals and raves. In response to Kurland, I wanted top emulate the style of her very soft and light images in which I focussed on capturing inside to make it more authentic to my group. In relation to McGinley, I captured more grungy black and white images which tend to be at night time.

Write a bibliography using Harvard system

Bibliography

https://www.photopedagogy.com/uploads/5/0/0/9/50097419/week_5_abigail_solomon-godeau_inside_out.pdf

https://www.miandn.com/artists/justine-kurland

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Justine_Kurland

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ryan_McGinley

How has Tristan Still and Fred Mortagne explored the movement in skateboarding within their work?

SKATEBOARDING IS FAR BETTER THAN ANYTHING MAGAZINE’. ‘The spine of British skateboarding magazine ‘Sidewalk Surfer’, Issue 24, March ’98. One would be hard pressed to find a skateboarder who would disagree. The words – ‘Skateboarding is better than sex’ – more than once have been uttered to me at a skate park or dropped in a philosophical discussion of life between skateboarders. In this study I am going to investigate how the world of skateboarding and the movement in it can be portrayed through photography, capturing photographs from unusual angles that you do not usually see in skateboarding photography. I have been skateboarding from the age of 13 and have always been interested in the media side of skateboarding, whether that is filming or photographing skateboarding. I want to show in this study how the world can be portrayed through skateboarding and how differently the world is seen through a skateboarder’s eyes. Two photographers pop up in mind when I think about my intentions with this study, Tristan Still and Fred Mortagne. These certain photographers portray the world of skateboarding in their own unique ways, with Fred Mortagne even being nicknamed ‘Frangle’ – the unusual angle only he sees. Both artists have been documenting skateboarding since the 1990s, when skateboarding first started gaining popularity, capturing genuine and gritty shots of early skateboarders. This study could be linked with my previous urban photography work, as skateboarding is all about finding new spots within urban areas to experiment different tricks with. In this study I have explored finding new unused angles within the urban area of jersey as well as the skatepark to capture unique photographs of skaters. My work has developed from just taking my camera out with me every time I go for a skate with my friends, taking photographs of them as we skate about to create this photobook. Different digital processes were used to create some of my final images, such as Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom editing.

Both of my artists and my own work seem to relate to the photographic movement of Realism. Photo-realism first emerged in America in the 1960’s, it grew out of the Pop and Minimalism movements that preceded it. Photorealists were interested in breaking down hierarchies of appropriate subject matter by including everyday scenes of commercial life in their work. One of the biggest influences of the Photo-realism movement was Walker Evans, born in 1903 he is best known for his work for the Farm Security Administration documenting the effects of the Great Depression, his elegant, crystal-clear photographs and articulate publications have inspired several generations of artists. Artists such as Paul Strand photographed subjects on the streets of New York, to which he referred his work as ‘Straight Photography’. With Straight Photography the goal was to depict a scene or subject in sharp focus and detail, many photographers used darkroom techniques and manipulation to their images to enhance the appearance of their photographs. Skateboarding photography fits perfectly into the subject of ‘Straight Photography’, capturing your subject with sharp focus as they attempt to land a trick, or capturing a photograph of multiple skaters with sharp detail as they all attempt tricks. Skateboarding photography started to emerge in the 1980’s, around the same time ‘street’ skateboarding first started to gain popularity. Skaters would go out with whatever camera they had and start documenting their sport. During the early days of skate photography, magazines, zines, and write-ups from media were almost the only way to distribute the photographs taken by these photographers, with one of the artists I am exploring mainly having their photographs portrayed through magazines. As the Internet became bigger and more dominant photographers could easily show off their work through apps such as Instagram the landscape of skateboarding photography was altered indefinitely. It became very easy to show off skate photography, gaining it much more attention and leading to a very big variety of different styles of skate photography. Weather theses different styles involved using different lenses or photo manipulation techniques, skateboarding photography has evolved so much since it first started to emerge in the early 1980’s.

The first photographer who I am exploring is Tristan Still, a multidisciplinary artist whose work is driven by his own personal relations, mostly in the photographic practice. His work has been published internationally and has won several awards for his work over his career. From 1996 to 2011 Tristan Still photographed skateboarders all over Australia in what he describes as his ‘personal search for Animal Chin,’ the proclaimed founder of skateboarding. ‘Skateboarding is powerful enough to change one’s vision of the world – concrete is no longer simply a building material, a bench is no longer just for sitting, and stairs and accompanying handrails are no longer simply devices to aid one in descending or ascending from one level to another. The urban world is a massive and intricate playground to be explored, full of potential.’ (reference using Harvard system) Tristan Stills work on skateboarding features not just the skateboarders posing and doing tricks, but also has a focus on the movements behind these tricks. Landing certain tricks with the right movements can be extremely difficult and Tristan Captures the right movements and moments within his photography. In this image photographed by Tristan, it showcases the perfect movement and moment a skater is mid-air in a stylistic pose. The image is shot in black and white, which I believe is very effective and adds focus to the main subject of the image, the movement of the skateboarder, as well as this, the black and white colouring of the image makes it much easier to see just how much height the skater has managed to get making the photograph much more impressive. The black grainy edges around the image seem to almost pinpoint the skater as the main subject of the image also, making it a much more effective image.

The second artist whose work I am exploring is Fred Mortagne, a French born artist who has a unique style of photographing skateboarders. As a teenager, Fred Mortagne shot his friends skateboarding through the historic city centre of his home Lyon. He grew to film and photograph some of skateboarding’s most iconic characters. Bit by bit, Mortagne began to blend still photography into his film. ‘I became used to visualising angles that would be good for photography, but didn’t necessarily work for video’, (reference using Harvard system) employing a 24-90mm lens with a high ISO so he can get a better grain within his images he has become known for picturing from angles no one else sees. Mortagne got one of his earliest shots of a skateboarder coursing through a hotels carpark while leaning off a balcony of a hotel room on the 17th floor. ‘Bewitched by skateboarding at the age of 8, my passion for the “useless wooden toy” eventually became the catalyst for my life to come. While feeling out of place at school, entering the adult world seemed like a never-ending foggy day. No perspectives at sight. Skateboarding was the only guiding light. It brought all the missing links: freedom, fun, friends, adventures… and all of a sudden, my future gained clarity.’ (reference using Harvard system) Mortagne’s work almost completely consists of black and white images, this creates a clear contrast between the skateboarders pictured in his images and the landscape surrounding them. With usual skateboarding photography, the focus is mainly on the subject within that image, but with Mortagne’s work the focus seems to be on the environment that the subject is within, leading to some very interesting pieces of work. Nearly 25 years since Mortagne started filming skaters he released his first photobook titled “Attraper Au Vol” (Catch in the Air) and features images of skaters on locations all over the world. ‘With skateboarding, you travel a lot trying to find new spots, we skate around modern buildings which often also happen to be very photogenic’ (reference using Harvard system). Mortagne explains that when you film skateboarders it is very close up, so you lose the dimension of where the skateboarders fully are, and he wanted to recapture that dimension within his photography. Attraper au vol is the culmination of Mortagne’s photographic career, from 2000 to 2015. A feast of lines and angles, his black-and-white compositions blend his subjects into their environments, offering an abstract perspective on architecture, geometry and the human figure. This image from Mortagne showcases the idea behind his work very well. The picture shows a skateboarder attempting a varial flip, as he is pictured from a very unusual angle that is showcasing architecture of a city as well, which is a unique but effective take on skateboarding photography. The skaters movement is perfectly captured within an opening of the architecture suggesting that anywhere can be skated with the right movements.

In conclusion, both artists who I have explored, Tristan Still and Fred Mortagne, showcase the movement of skateboarders through photography in their own ways. Tristan Still using a more traditional way of capturing skaters, showcasing the movements through up close shots as well as clear wide shots of skaters attempting tricks and skating around. While Fred Mortagne uses a less traditional way of capturing the movements of skaters, using unusual angles through the landscape around them to create some very interesting pieces of work. Both artists approach to photographing skateboarding is very different, however they both have the same outcomes, capturing the movement of skaters perfectly within their environments. Both artists have photographed in black and white, which I believe has made their work even more impactful as it provides a main focus on the subjects in the image instead of their surroundings, where the focus may be lost and the whole image would become less effective. Overall, both artists have used their own unique styles to capture the movement within skateboarding very effectively.

Bibliography

Renaldi, R. (2017), BJP #7856: Tales of the City

https://www.tristanstill.com/skateboarding-life

In what ways has LaToya Ruby Frazier represented identity between generations of women?

“It’s imperative we tell our own stories, controlling the framework, content and narrative” (LaToya Ruby Frazier, 2018)

This essay will explore how female identity has been represented through different generations of women. The hypothesis will draw upon the work of LaToya Ruby Frazier , particularly the work around Braddock and the social, economical and political changes that her hometown has had on her family. For example, research into her celebrated body of work, The Notion of Family, published in 2014 has enabled me to gain different perspectives on the role of feminism in art, the influence of female role models within family structures, and how women are represented in photography specifically. Growing up with a single mother and solely women in my upbringing has influenced my interest in my essay topic and led to my research in the representation of women in art and historical family roles. In her book The Notion of Family, Frazier uses poignant images of multiple generations of women in her family. These images highlight the history of her family and the plight they have faced as working-class African American women in an ex-mining town in rural America. The intimate, deeply personal portraits in this photobook create thought-provoking sentiments about the ideas of womanhood, women in the family and female identity throughout multiple generations. She considers her work a “conceptual documentary”,(Harris, 2014), and she uses her work not only to show that of familial relationships, but “as a vehicle for both social change and aesthetic possibility: beauty, in her work, does not preclude protest any more than education presumes awareness.”. These ideas further influenced my interest in Frazier’s work, and this is something that I like to use in my work. Frazier’s documentarian approach creates more insightful images, with heavily contextual images detailing the struggles of those whose voices often go unheard: not only women but working-class, African American women.

To respond to my selected artists, I am using archival images as well as new images of myself, my mother and my grandmother, drawing inspiration from family records. I plan to compare feeling, pose and appearance between new and archive images (taken from photo albums), to produce a thoughtful commentary on how female identity changes through three generations. I will explore this mainly through photomontage and collage, a method that I have used successfully in the past and want to develop in this project. Subsequently, in this essay, I will discuss the historical representation of women: in art, photography, and families and reference my key artist and her work about female identity and generations of women.

Throughout many periods of history, both in society, culture and art, the portrayal of women, the ‘role of a woman’ and family structures are presented in many different ways. Throughout historical western society, women have been consistently presented as the primary caregivers, both for their children, for the home and their husbands. This can be seen in sculpture and art dating back to as early as the 1500s. Women in art around his period and up until the late 20th century were presented as fragile and soft and as a “passive object, and the receiver of an active male gaze” (Kaufman 2005). For example, in the Italian renaissance, women were, like women of the middle ages, denied all political rights and considered legally bound to their husbands. Women were considered merely housewives, and if not married were not allowed to live independently. During this period, women were presented in art as vain, and self-obsessed figures were presented only for the pleasure of the male onlooker. For example, in Giovanni Bellini’s 1515 painting “Young Woman at her Toilette”, the nude female subject is presented as a symbol of wealth, with Bellini using rich green tones and the feature of a Venetian landscape to her left. This painting connotes a sense of calm and softness, which further highlights the way women were represented during the renaissance period.

With the invention of photography in the early 19th century, the representations of women were seemingly unchanged. Male photographers dominated the art, with the majority of images extremely serious and posed. Family portraits at this time were the same: mothers were pictured holding their children, with the father standing above with a stern look on his face. Even this layout highlights the place women had in society in the time in victorian society, at the time of the invention of photography. The identity of women represented in these early images was that of a mother, a housewife, and an inferior figure to her husband, who loomed above her, somewhat threateningly, demonstrating power and control. Another sub-genre of these early portraits was the so-called “Hidden Mother Photography”, which was a genre that included portraits of young children, with their mother present, but hidden in the photograph. This genre grew more popular due to the long exposure times of early cameras, and the need for mothers to hold their children still for long periods. These images are somewhat chilling – despite their seemingly innocent nature, they show how mothers were seen as objects and merely useful for parenting – the concealment of the mothers’ bodies and faces creates a sense that “The mothers seem to have been aiming to create an intimate bond between the child and the viewer, rather than between themselves and the child.” (Nagler 2013). This subscribes to the mother wanting to please the viewer, creating a perfect picture of her child for those looking at the image, a polished ideal of the relationship and identity that exists between a mother and child. This manipulation shows the early presence of the male gaze and its influence on representations of female identity in photography.

Moving into the 20th century, as women had more and more freedom and a louder voice within society, many female photographers began to document their identity in their own words – not in the words of men who have controlled the media and the role of women within the media for decades. The male gaze has become more and more redundant in recent years, with developments in all of the areas of the visual arts that lean towards more of the female gaze – images that do not solely exist for the visual pleasure of the male onlooker – “Woman as image, man as bearer of the look”. Instead, as the influence of feminism has become more visible in photography, many female photographers have produced images and series that depict their own identity, for themselves, or the viewing of other women – these can be powerful, as they depict female voices within the arts that have been silenced and altered for centuries. For example, Carrie Mae Weems created an iconic photograph which represents an intimate portrait of motherhood, through an understated kitchen depiction of a mother and daughter with makeup. This depiction of a mother-daughter relationship contrasts violently with the silenced mothers in the “Hidden Mother” portraits of Victorian mothers, whose relationships with their children were censored and removed from the images. The image below highlights the struggle that women in visual art, especially photography, have experienced to create work that represents them as the women they are today.

African – American photographer LaToya Ruby Frazier’s images are crucial pieces in the development of the modern media’s representations of women. She considers her work closely related to sociology, documenting the struggles of working-class African American American women. The media and its’ representations are central to Frazier’s work. The fact that Frazier considers her work sociological is important to the context of her images – her work is not journalistic, as she seeks to separate her narratives from that of the media, drawing a line between her personal experiences, and the media’s representation of such: “If I were a journalist, I would not be able to edit and frame my photographs. I look for a narrative or context that will amplify the voices of the marginalised…and the current issues we face.” (Frazier 2018). This quote of Frazier’s signifies how taking a sociological approach to her subjects allows her to tell her own story, without bias and as she wishes – not as society wishes, for a journalist. In her work, Frazier not only documents social issues but the generations of women in her family. In her highly acclaimed project, “The Notion of Family”, she creates unique documentary images in which she features herself, her mother and her grandmother. Through her work, Frazier herself documents her own family and their surrounding stories. She seeks to dismantle discriminatory ideas of women and disadvantaged communities like her own in Braddock, Pennsylvania and creates unfiltered and stark images of her female relatives, which create an eye-opening reality of her family’s experiences. Frazier’s work subsequently has strong links to feminism – as a woman she uses her work as a tool of resistance against stereotypical representations of black women. Her images are heavily contextualised, each subject with their own stories and experiences told within the project, dismissing the female stereotype of vanity, and shallowness, as projected by the male gaze: “An endlessly reproductive imitation of surface” (Phelan 1993). Instead, Frazier’s imagery appeals to the female gaze, rejecting surface-level depictions of women, and creating her own narrative. Her modern depictions of female identity and marginalization are opposite to the historical depictions mentioned above – Frazier disproves the historical preconceptions of women, and creates a modern display of female power and experience in her work.

This image of Frazier’s is from “The Notion of Family” project. The photograph is black and white, which creates stark contrast – for example, the middle has a large concentration of black tones. This creates a clear division between the two parts of the composition which could signify a dividing factor in the family which drives the two subjects apart. This could be a reason why Frazier chose this composition. This black-toned area of the photograph matches the black of the t-shirt of the subject to the left, creating a link between these two areas of the picture. This image uses the rule of thirds which can be seen in all parts: on the left the start of the black doorframe, creating the first third, the whole of the doorframe creating the centre third, and the rest of the image to the right creating the last. The focal point in this image is the door, which creates a high contrast with the different tones of the white towel. It could be said that the inclusion of separation in this image, with the door, could reference separation between generations – it may signify turbulence within their relationship. This separation is intriguing, as it could have many different meanings. It is possible that the photographer composed her image in this way to force the viewer to question what they think about the photograph, and what they think the work relates to. The composition raises questions about the posing of the image, and the context, something personal to Frazier and her mother. Additionally, The exclusion of faces and the body language of the two subjects could signify tension between the two characters or unsettled feelings. The inclusion of dark spaces in this photograph suggests trouble or problems within the family – in this context the plight of Frazier’s family as former steel miners, suffering the consequences of a failed industry. Within the image, there is a sense of nostalgia, helped by the presentation of the two subjects but also the aesthetic qualities: it was shot on film and in black and white which creates a more sentimental image of family. As seen throughout “The Notion of Family”, Frazier’s use of a film camera and “20th Century documentary aesthetic” (Frazier 2014) is used to document the lives of three generations of women, whose lives “parallel the rise and fall of the steel mill industry”. Frazier uses film and ‘old-fashioned’ methods to relate her work to the time in which the steel-milling industry began to fail, the late 20th century. The collapse of this industry had a direct effect on its workers, leaving them without income and subsequently developing severe health problems. By using photographic processes popular at the time, Frazier creates a link between the surface-level elements of her photograph the technical processes), with the plight of her subjects.

Overall, Latoya Ruby Frazier’s project “The Notion of Family” is a powerful display of female identity, documenting the plight of African American women in modern America. Her work represents generational identity with unfiltered images of her family, unravelling the stereotypes of women seen historically: through art, racism, the media, and sexism. This influences Frazier’s sociological approach to her work, examining the contextual problems behind her work instead of purely aesthetics. Frazier’s unique approach to her work has therefore influenced my project: rather than looking purely at technical things such as composition and framing in my image, although still important, I have begun to arrange and compose my images in a way that creates a narrative – creating intimate images of myself and my family. These images tell a story of lineage, generational change and identity. In my project, like Frazier, I have sought to create meaningful portraits of women, delving below surface-level stereotypes.

This image of my own is heavily influenced by the work of LaToya Ruby Frazier. It was carefully composed using the rule of thirds: the first third is comprised of the mirror and its’ wall, with the reflections. The middle third perfectly frames the first subject’s shoulders, making her the focal point of the image. The right third then frames the last subject. This composition to the right of the image isolates the two subjects in their separate parts of the photograph – this is contrasted with the left of the image, in which the mirror shows them together. The two subjects have different viewpoints and gaze in different parts, created by the reflections of the mirror: to the left, the subject is looking through the mirror towards the camera, suggesting a sense of looking inward or self-reflection. In the centre, the second subject is looking directly at the camera, but in the mirror, she gazes away. The subjects are looking in opposite directions, but as mother and daughter, I think the inclusion of a mirror in this image centralises the idea of generational identity, especially between women: historically women were seen as vain and self-centred, and including a mirror in my work has re- identified a mirror as a symbol of identity and similarity between two women.

Bibliography

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Kaufman, A (2005), Undoing The Patriarchy in Art, https://serendipstudio.org/sci_cult/courses/beauty/web4/akaufman.html, accessed 30th January 2023

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Representation of Women in Art Through the Ages, Google Arts and Culture, https://artsandculture.google.com/usergallery/representation-of-women-in-art-through-the-ages/jwKisGWJM5SWKA, accessed 31 January 2023

‘Timeline of Women in Photography’ (2018) Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_women_in_photography, accessed 31st January 2023

“Women in the Renaissance”, in The Italian Renaissance, Sparknotes, https://www.sparknotes.com/history/european/renaissance1/section9/, accessed 31 January 2023.

For my last shoot, I decided to do a landscape shoot inspired by the landscape images taken by my artist reference Vasantha Yogananthan, trying to evoke parts of his style in my colour choices.

While not a perfect match, I do really like the influence Yogananthan’s style had on my editing and colour choices.

For my third shoot I decided to use old images from a visit to South Africa several years ago, because they were not taken with the intention of this project, there were not many but I did find them useful.

I edited a selection of images in both colour and monochrome to take inspiration from both Frazier and Yogananthan.

Despite my inexperience when I conducted this shoot, I do really like how these final images look, especially my colour ones.

I decided to do a shoot of a collection of objects and images inside my house, focusing on objects related to myself and my family.

I decided to alternate between monochrome and coloured images, taking inspiration from both LaToya Ruby Frazier and Vasantha Yogananthan. Again I do not have many pictures from this shoot due to camera issues on the day.