Final Photobook

Below is my final photo book complete with my essay, created in Lightroom Classic.

This is my back cover (left) and the front cover of my photobook. I decided to call my book “Pink Slippers”. This title was inspired by images in my book of my mother’s slippers – they are a special item to me, as putting my mother’s and grandmothers slipper’s is a fond childhood memory of mine, symbolising my relationship with them. I named the book specifically pink slippers due to the pink pages included in the book, but also because of the female subjects – the inclusion of a typical female colour on the cover, in the image, title and spine foreshadows the content.

The first image in this book is that of myself as a child – I have an inquisitive look on my face, which creates a simple start to the book, causing the viewer to perhaps feel the same. The pink tones of my t-shirt match the pink page of the title page previous, linking the pages together. This page was also placed at the start of my book to introduce the first subject and the different time frames used.

These 4 pages further introduce the subjects of my book and the inclusion of an archival image of my mother on the left spread leads well into the right, showing a passage of time in her life, including myself also.

These are two of my favourite spreads from my photobook, in sequence. The first spread is of an image from my identity project, featuring archival and new material of my mum. The collage has a reflective feel, as on the right she seems to glance at her past self – this nostalgic mood is helped by the background image of her old bedroom, and B and W colouring. The following double-page spread leads on nicely – the right image has a second reflective and sentimental feel to it, with the inclusion of the mirror picturing the subject looking wistfully at herself – I liked using a mirror for this project, as it enabled me to get lots of different perspectives from one shot, creating a multi-dimensional image.

These two sequenced spreads create a display of generational identity and age when placed next to each other. The spread on the left features images of my grandmother, which creates a contrasting collage (the process of making these in my previous post) of her life and story. The double page spread to the right is of my mother, shot in the same location as the image of my nana in the collage. Both these pages feature similar tones: red, orange, and beige. On the left, the sand of the bottom image link with the colour of the wall in the right spread, and the read of an image on the left match with the red and orange of the curtains to the right.

These two spreads are of my mother – the first on the left is a double-page spread taken from my identity project, possibly my favourite from the whole project. The warm tones in this spread are contrasted with the stark black and white of the next image. The right image is another of my favourites from this project. In my opinion, it gives a strong presentation of not just female identity, but identity in the home and through multiple generations. The image features objects on the table to the left that are important in my mum’s personal identity – the book and bookcase in the background to the left highlight her interest in them, as reading is and has been very important in her life. Her pose and facial expressions show her personality further, as she sits in her own house, looking unwaveringly at the camera. To me, this also represents her role in my life, as my sole caregiver and the source of knowledge and strength in my life This image paints a portrait of strong female heritage, including a photo of my great-grandmother. She was a very important role model in my mum’s life, and including her portrait felt crucial to me when documenting my home and also

These are the final spreads of my book – they are understated, quiet images which I spoke about in my previous post, to create a natural end to my book. The left spread features an image to the right which can be seen as a symbol of age, with a faceless image of my grandma, with only parts of her skin and white hair visible – this image is much different to others in the book, more secretive and understated. This image and spread can be seen to symbolise identity due to the feature of my nana’s simple pink hair clip, which symbolises one of the most important parts of her physical identity, both to herself and others. The spread on the right has one of the few object images in my book – it is that of a broken mirror from a memory box I used photos from. This mirror links to the images above taken in the mirror of my mother and grandmother but is broken. The broken mirror could connote a sense of altered or mixed-up time or identity, or just the changing of one’s personality. This links to the jumbled look of my photobook, which mixes up time scales and eras.

Above is the inclusion of my final essay in my photobook – I used pink pages again here to continue the theme through to the very end of my book, using the same font and text as the front cover and spine.

Final Prints

Below is a selection of my final prints – I have quite a lot for this project, due to my high volume of images. I have analysed most of them above, but there are a few images not seen in my photobook I decided to print also. I have decided to print most of them in A3, but the series of 3 self-portraits are going to be in A4, presented in a trio.

Evaluation

(Photobook evaluated throughout final presentation above)

Photoshoots

The first shoots I completed were my self-portrait shoots. I found these to be overall successful shoots, with at least 5 successful images from each set but found it quite difficult to create quality compositions. I found it difficult to envision what I was capturing as I was in front of the camera, and coming forward to press my shutter for the timer for each set of 10 images became annoying. in future, if I was to create more self-portraits I would use a more effective setup, with a lead to press a shutter from my position in front of the camera, and perhaps a camera with a flippable viewfinder. Aesthetically these images improved in quality as I moved into my second shoot, shooting in a better light after evaluating my first shoot. Overall these first shoots were a useful starting point – directing myself in front of the camera made it easier to work with my two other subjects in my later photoshoots and also helped me to cope with difficult lighting at times.

Photoshoots 1 and 2 – Self Portraits

The rest of my shoots improved as I went along. I do feel that I took too many images – or that I did too many shoots, as I found it difficult working with such a large amount of images in my exam and fitting them into my book without having too many pages. When photographing my archival material, I’m glad that I used an array of types of images – this made it easier for me when experimenting with collages and layouts in my book and gave me more choice and room to experiment. I struggled a little with the compositional elements of my portraits but found I became more at ease with directing my family as the photoshoots progressed and I became more familiar with how the environments photographed. In this way, I’m glad I produced the volume of shoots I did, as it meant I had more room to improve and change my photography to match my ideas and create better outcomes.

Editing

I like to edit in black and white and also in colour, but found in this project I preferred a lot more colour images. A lot of my images had vibrant colours which matched well with the colours of my archival material. However, I still found B and W editing useful as it created nice contrasts with my other spreads.

Experimentation and Layout

I found making my photobook (analysed above and in the last post) initially difficult, but I think that as I got used to the layout and process and began to really enjoy it. I think this was also due to my previous experience of creating zines from my trip to America in September – this helped me to understand the layouts of my book more easily.

Making my Final Zine and Evaluation

Selection Process

Collage Making and Experiments

I used photoshop to create my collages, as developed from my identity project in year 12. – In this project, I tried to make use of more creative layouts and to create a stronger narrative of generational identity in my collages.

Final Collages

These collages were a development from the collages I produced in my year 12 Identity project. I developed my pieces in this project by using different types of images, especially including myself and different archival images – creating new presentations of generational identity through solely female perspectives. I created much more simple collages in this project, in order to keep these outcomes in line with the whole layout of my book. Using similar images to those used in the rest of my book in these collages helped the cohesion of all parts of my book, making sure the book flowed well from start to finish. I like how my final collages are vibrant and colourful, which to me represents the characters of both my grandmother and mother – vibrant colours are a running theme in my photobook, which represent my childhood, and my upbringing in many different places and within nature as a child. Creating a photo book with personal meaning and with my own perspectives was important to me as women are often silenced and ignored when telling their own stories – presented in a way that is not truth and only for the benefit of the onlooker. Therefore, by producing these collages and this project altogether, I feel that I am producing my own stories, with female truth.

Creating the Layout

I started with 50 pages but as I began to add images, I realised I needed more pages. In the end, I had 70 pages – I feel that this is slightly too many but due to the volume of my images and the different layouts I wanted for my book, I am happy with this amount. Having this amount of pages has enabled me to create the narrative which I had envisioned for my book, creating a cohesive beginning, middle and end of my book.

In this first bit of experimentation, I was getting used to the layout of the book format in Lightroom, experimenting with different image layouts. I didn’t want to create a book that was too busy, with too many different layouts of images – I tried to use consistently similar layouts: single and double-page spreads, with some images smaller and larger.

I found it initially difficult to deal with a large volume of pages, and working on lots of pages at once was overwhelming at first. To combat this, I focused on certain parts at a time – for example, the start or end parts. This also helped me to continue the narrative and story in the book that I was trying to create. I included my strongest images in the middle, placing importance on the middle spreads. Towards the beginning and end of my book, I used understated, gentler images to vary the types of photographs used.

This was a collection of my final experiments with my book. When adding some images to my book, and previewing the outcome altogether, I realised some images were not edited quite to the quality I wanted. I was able to make editing adjustments right from the book into develop mode. (seen above) It was helpful to make quick adjustments to potential images in my book and also helped me to narrow down my selections of quality images. This allowed me to keep the highest quality work in my book. Also in this final set of experiments, I experimented with colour pages. I decided to include these colour pages throughout my book, roughly every few pages. I included these pages in a pinky-purple colour: it matched well with the amount of pink and purple tones in the book, but also can be seen as a symbol of femininity and childhood – this links well to my project as I wanted to touch on the idea of pre-conceived ideas of femininity and mother figures, and present these ideas through my own experiences and family, flipping the gaze into that of the female gaze, opposed to the traditional male gaze seen in the mainstream media.

(Full evaluation of my book and images in a separate blog post.)

Aim of my final shoots

This shoot is one for this project. In this photoshoot, I will develop my portrait work through images of my mother, the both of us, and a few last self-portraits. Most of these shoots are heavily influenced, compositionally wise, by Hannah Altman’s images of herself and her mother. Latoya Ruby Frazier’s work also helped me to plan these photoshoots, especially her self-portrait work. In my photographs, I want to convey female family relationships, in relation to personal and situational identity (in the home). Using key images for reference in these shoots will help me to direct/carry out the shoot as easily as possible, influencing my compositions, posing and lighting, to create the highest quality outcomes. I’m going to produce single images of my mother, as well as photographs of the both of us, inspired by the images below. After creating images of my mother and I, I am going to create images of my mum and grandmother, and possibly all three of us – I am doing my shoots in this order to make sure my ideas develop in a way that will help the development of my final outcomes. As well as taking portraits, I plan to take a few object images that relate closely to my family identity, as well as photographing more archival images to use in my collages for my book. This is because, in my first photoshoot of archival images, I realised after that I felt that I didn’t have enough images – I often use multiple archive images in one collage and I want to make sure I have more than enough quality material to work with.

Photoshoot 5

Idea	Subject	Settings	Props	Lighting	Genre
Generational identity, mother and daughter relationships, personal identity	My mum, grandmother and I.	Creative Auto, portrait	Camera, Tripod	Natural – window lighting	Portrait, object.

Photoshoot plan

Contact Sheets

At the start of my shoot, I stuggled slightly – I began shooting in my porch, and had trouble with overexposure as the light was coming from behind me. I combatted this by moving my shooting position to the right, and directing my subject to move her head lightly towards me. The lighting then improved, and I think I acheived some of my best images from my shoot in this location.

As the photoshoot progressed, I found it easier to direct my subject, and found adapting to the difficult lighiting in my house easier – I found that as the shoot progressed the quality of the images increased.

Editing

Final Images

I originally edited this in B and W, but decided to turn it back to colour after comparing the two edits with virtual copies in lightroom. I chose to keep this image in colour due to the warm tones which I really like: the brown and blonde in the subject’s hair, in the cushion and in the lamp in thr backgroynd. This creates a flow of leading lines throughout the composition and adds personality to the image – something that black and white can sometimes lack.

This image is one of my favourite edits of my whole project – i edited in black and white in order to emulate the work of LaToya Ruby Frazier, and also to correct over warmth and exposure in the original image (as seen above)

I edited this image with more retro tones – as above, I used colour grading to acheive this, which I developed from previous photoshoots. I edited my image in this way to create a nostalgic mood – this will fit better with my archival images and the tones of those images. This will create more coherent spreads in my book.

I had trouble editing this image – there are high amounts of contrasting tones: the wall and face of my subject are much lighter than the deep black of her jumper. When editing I had trouble keeping the edit subtle and not too contrasted, due to the differing tones in the image. I had to complete multiple edits before deciding on the final one.

Evaluation

Overall I think this shoot produced some really successful outcomes. I shot earlier in the day, learning from my last shoots which were shot too late in the day. I used different locstions to shoot in, such as my porch and also my living room floor, which created some different compositions. I think that my initial framing of photographs when I was shooting could have been improved, as I had to crop most of my images while editing them. Even though I had a few editing issues with differing light and contrast, I think my editing was successful. i’m glad I produced outcomes in colour and monochrome as this means I have a wider variety of outcomes to choose from for my photobook selections and layout.

Photoshoot 6

As well as producing portrait photographs from these shoots, I photographed more archival images from albums at my home – different to the ones I gathered in my last shoots at my grandmother’s house. I didn’t need to alter these images much, just rotating and sometimes turning the exposure up – I shot these in low light, so I did turn the exposure up on a few of the images in the end.

Portrait Images from this shoot

Contact Sheets and evaluation

One of my contact sheets from this shoot – I didn’t struggle with much from this shoot, as I had shot in this location before and was familiar with the lighting. Images in my grandmother’s bedroom were really successful as there was 2 sources of light, creates soft and balanced light in my images. As this shoot was a development from my previous shoots, I created some really successful outcomes – drawing on inspiration from my chosen artists, mistakes from previous shoots and my own new ideas. I edited my images in the same way as pictured above in my previous shoot. I focused on B and W edits only for this shoot.

Final Images

Contact Sheets

At first, in this shoot I struggled with overexposure shooting in my mum’s bedroom – I combatted this by closing the curtains and changing my position. The day I was shooting was quite overcast, so this didn’t help. I found shooting in my hallway easier, due to the better light – this was mainly due to the helpful overhead light from my skylight.

These pictures are from my grandmother’s house – the lighting was much better here, due to two sources of light in the bedroom. The central position of my grandmother’s bed helped me to create better compositions in my images.

These are more photographs at my grandmother’s – I think in this shoot the photos improved as the shoot continued, with better composition and lighting helping.

Editing

Final Images

Evaluation

Overall, I found this shoot to be successful – I hadn’t taken portraits in a while before carrying out this shoot, so it took me a while at the start of the shoot to get to grips with directing my subject, using lighting correctly and adjusting settings effectively on the camera. This shoot was definitely an improvement from my first self portrait shoot – I had better planning and organisation, which really helped me to produce more quality outcomes. Plsnning locations and times specifically before shooting really helped me in this shoot. Although this photoshoot was still successful, I need to carry out at least one or two other portrait shoots in order to have a high enough amount of quality images to use for collages and final prints.

Photoshoot 4

Contact Sheets

I took these in late afternoon, so had a little trouble with redness/orange lighting from overhead lights as it got darker. To combat this, I ended up taking the last few images outside. I could have avoided these issues by using a copystand at school, but most of these images are very precious and I wouldn’t want to bring them in out of their albums – the images still turned out even with the minor issues and weren’t affected too much so this didn’t change much in terms of quality.

Editing

I don’t need to edit these images much initially – they all are more or less as I want them. However, when combining them with other images i may edit them a little to make them more similar, or to correct over/under exposure. I used a red colour label to separate my best images out of the shoot and cropped/ rotated images as needed. I wanted to keep raw edges and imperfections in the images, as I think taking them away removes their authenticity to a point.

Best Images

Below are my best archival images from this shoot.

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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Photoshoot plan

Genre	Lighting	Props	Camera Settings	Idea	Location
Portraiture	Artificial	Tripod	Continuous shooting (10 at once)	Self – portraiture	Home – lounge and bedroom

Contact Sheets

Editing

Overall I think my editing was quite successful – at first, I tried editing in colour but due to the poor light quality in these images, I changed to black and white. I prefer editing in black and white with high contrast and grain even with better-lit images so this worked well.

After doing numerous edits in black and white, I created copies of various best images and began to experiment with colour grading in colour, and then in black and white. I don’t know if these images will necessarily be in my final outcomes but I still think they were quite successful.

My experimentation with colour grading was helpful as it will be something I can use later on in this project, for example when editing other images for different parts of the project.

Final Images

Evaluation

This photoshoot could be improved. The lack of good lighting impacted the quality of my images as I was shooting using overhead lighting that was too warm-toned. I tried to combat this with white balance, ISO and using a cool tone which did help slightly but I think I will carry out another photoshoot of self-portraits with much better light, possibly in another location. I want to touch on my identity linked to the location in the photos, which I did touch on a little in this shoot but due to struggles with lighting my locations were limited around my house. I plan to re-develop this shoot at my grandmother’s house, or again at my house, now that I have gotten to grips with the correct camera settings, using my tripod effectively and positioning myself in the way I want compositionally. However, I think this photoshoot was in some parts successful – I produced quite a few images which I like, showing my personality which was a strong point of this shoot. I wanted to bring across my identity in this photoshoot, and then be able to link this later on to how this links with my mother and grandmother’s identities, both now and also with the help of archival material, which then forms the main idea of my project. Having completed this photoshoot, I am going to carry out another self-portrait shoot which links more directly to my archival material and with better lighting quality.

Photoshoot 2

Lighting	Subject	Location	Idea	Theme	Props	Settings
Natural, window lighting with some overhead lights.	Myself	Bedroom, living room	Personal Identity, generational identity, adolescence	Self-portraiture	Tripod, camera.	Creative Auto, portrait.

Aims of the shoot

This shoot is a development of my last self-portrait shoot. As I discussed above in my evaluation for my last shoot, I have gained further inspiration from photographing archival family images. These images have given me inspiration for posing, framing and editing – I plan to juxtapose archival and new images in my photo book and I feel that the development of this new shoot will generate further images that will draw clearer comparisons between the two sets of images. This photoshoot is in the same location as my last shoot: my bedroom and living room, which are two places of significant personal identity to me. I wanted to show this through my poses, background and attitudes throughout my shoot, taking inspiration for these aspects from my archival images. In this shoot, I aimed to take images with improved lighting quality than my last shoot – as shown above, I took my images too late in the day which produced poorly lit and overly grainy images, and this shoot was planned in part because of this also.

Contact Sheets

At the start of my shoot, I struggled with the yellow lighting and warm tones of my living room. I shot in a better light than my last shoot, so I had less of a problem but it was still unhelpful – I only took a few images here and then moved to my bedroom.

After moving to my bedroom the lighting improved – I only used natural light which helped me in producing clear images. In my lounge I struggled with yellow-toned lighting which reduced the quality of my work – natural light helped.

These are my best images for the shoot, flagged and given a purple label which corresponds to this particular shoot.

Final Images

ESSAY: In the Spring term will be spending 1 lesson a week every Wednesday on writing and developing your essay. However, you will need to be working it independently outside of lesson time.

Objective: Criteria from the Syllabus

Be aware of some of the methods employed by critics and historians within the history of art and photography

Post Modernism

Demonstrate a sound understanding of your chosen area of study with appropriate use of critical vocabulary. – use for image analysis

Investigate a wide range of work and sources

Develop a personal and critical inquiry.

Academic Sources

Research and identify 3-5 literary sources from a variety of media such as books, journal/magazines, internet, Youtube/video:

https://witness.worldpressphoto.org/the-ethics-of-documenting-your-own-family-7225ca8bd59a

https://www.1854.photography/2019/11/humour-intimacy-and-sincerity-celebrating-family-photography/

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2022/nov/09/photographer-emma-hardy-family-life-in-pictures

https://www.booooooom.com/2020/08/10/photographer-spotlight-emma-hardy/

Mulvey, Laura (1973) ‘Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema’ in Screen (1975)

Frames of Mind: Photography, Memory and Identity

 Family Frames: Photography, Narrative and Postmemory. 

Begin to read essay, texts and interviews with your chosen artists as well as commentary from critics, historians and others. It’s important that you show evidence of reading and draw upon different pints of view – not only your own.Take notes when you’re reading…key words, concepts, passages Write down page number, author, year, title, publisher, place of publication so you can list source in a bibliography

Bibliography

Practice:

Sternfeld, J. (2003), American Prospects. Göttingen; Germany.

In Text Reference:

Direct Quote: In his book on conversations on photography, Sternfeld writes ‘

Paraphrasing: Sternfeld (2003)

Quotation and Referencing

Why should you reference?

To add academic support for your work

To support or disprove your argument

To show evidence of reading

To help readers locate your sources

To show respect for other people’s work

To avoid plagiarism

To achieve higher marks

What should you reference?

Anything that is based on a piece of information or idea that is not entirely your own.

That includes, direct quotes, paraphrasing or summarising of an idea, theory or concept, definitions, images, tables, graphs, maps or anything else obtained from a source

How should you reference?

Use Harvard System of Referencing…see Powerpoint: harvard system of referencing for further details on how to use it.

Essay Question

Think of a hypothesis and list possible essay questions:

To what extent do female role models influence personal identity, and how is this shown in Hannah Altman’s work?

In what ways have LaToya Ruby Frazier and Hannah Altman represented identity between generations of women?

How does Hannah Altman portray the delicate relationship between a mother and daughter?

https://www.hannahaltmanphoto.com/indoorvoices#1

To what extent is documenting your own family biased?

https://witness.worldpressphoto.org/the-ethics-of-documenting-your-own-family-7225ca8bd59a

How does the role of a mother differ as a single parent?

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2022/jan/26/single-parent-strength-a-photo-essay

Essay Plan

Make a plan that lists what you are going to write about in each paragraph – essay structure.

Essay question: In what ways have LaToya Ruby Frazier and Hannah Altman represented identity between generations of women?

Opening quote

Introduction (250-500 words): What is your area study? Which artists will you be analysing and why? How will you be responding to their work and essay question?

List photographers, links to context, what they both bring to my essay and how they informed my ideas.

Pg 1 (500 words): Historical/ theoretical context within art, photography, visual and popular culture relevant to your area of study. Make links to art movements/ isms and some of the methods employed by critics and historian. 

Historical portrayal of women – in art, film and photography. Links to feminism, female / male gaze. Use sources from key texts read.

Divine mother figure

Pg 2 (500 words): Analyse first artist/photographer in relation to your essay question. Present and evaluate your own images and responses.

Loookedatness – looking INWARD – reflective nature to her work. Sense of self, childhood,

Analyse key work, read interview, links to context behind her work, art theory and period

STEEPLY GENDERED…

‘spaces where girlhood is supposed to abide and womanhood stands guard”

Sociolgoist – with camera

Place in the family vs place in the world.

Richness of place and memory

socioeconomic elements

Deconstructs notion of a nuclear family. See below

The Notion of Family gilds its often grim truths with the hope of resistance, as in Frazier’s portraits of her Grandma Ruby—with her battalion of dolls, a stoic countenance, and a matriarchal sense of duty—who raised six children by herself on a Goodwill manager’s salary. In one photograph, she stands in her kitchen, her arm resting on the back of a chair where her grandson sits, light from the adjacent window pouring through a scrim of curtain and ivy, her nightgown slipping from her shoulder, her home a picture of order and cleanliness. “Grandma Ruby’s interior design was a firewall that blocked external forces,” Frazier writes.

Pg 3 (500 words): Analyse second artist/photographer in relation to your essay question. Present and evaluate your own images and responses.

Disrupting idea of the divine mother figure – picture analysed in artist reference.

Takes inspiration from Jewish Folklore and traditions in her image, similar to LTRF using socio economic context.

Presents generational identity and memory through exploring her family history and historical persecution as Jews.

What memory do the photographs leave? What sentiment?

Conclusion (250-500 words): Draw parallels, explore differences/ similarities between artists/photographers and that of your own work that you have produced

Compare both artists, context behind, link to my own work and reasons for producing.

Both extremely different artists but disrupting / representing the same things etc

use images

Both use images of the divine mother figure – link to first paragraph and to my own work

Bibliography: List all relevant sources used

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

Introduction (250-500 words): What is your area of study? Which artists will you be analysing and why? How will you be responding to their work and essay questions?

Pg 1 (500 words): Historical/ theoretical context within art, photography and visual culture relevant to your study area. Make links to art movements/ isms and some of the methods employed by critics and historians. 

Pg 2 (500 words): Analyse the first artist/photographer about your essay question. Present and evaluate your images and responses.

Conclusion (250-500 words): Draw parallels, and explore differences/ similarities between artists/photographers and the work that you have produced

Bibliography: List all relevant sources used

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

In this essay, I will discuss how photograph LaToya Ruby Frazier has represented generational identity between women. I have chosen this female artist as they explore the topic of female identity through generations in unique ways. For example, research into their work has enabled me to gain different perspectives on the role of feminism in photography, the influence of female role models through generations, and how women are represented in photography. These elements have formed the central points of this essay. Growing up with a single mother and solely women in my upbringing have influenced my interest in my essay topic and led to my research in historical portrayals of women, historical family roles and subsequently the choice of Ruby LaToya Frazier as my critical artist. Her photobook “The Nation of Family” has had a significant influence on the development of my project. In this photo book, 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, the modern of 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 techniques further influenced my interest in Frazier’s work – I have a personal interest in documentary photography and journalism, 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 archival material: 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 in relation to 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, A: “Undoing the Patriarchy in Art” 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, Early victorian family portraits and the disappearing mother, 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 completely 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 this could signify a dividing factor in the family which drives the two subjects apart. This could be a reason as to 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 photograph. This image uses the rule of thirds which can be seen in all parts: in 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 the questions of 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.

CONCLUSION

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 throughout 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 own project: rather than looking purely at technical things such as composition and framing in my image, although still important, I have began 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.

Bibliography

Phelan, P (1993)Unmarked: the politics of performance, Routledge, Oxfordshire.

Hirsch, M, (1997) Family Frames: Photography, Narrative and Postmemory. Harvard University Press, Massechusets.

Jansen, C (2017) Girl on Girl: Art and Photography in the Age of the Female Gaze, Laurence King Publishing, London.

Mulvey, L (1973) Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema in Screen, 1975.

Harris, J (2014), The Paris Review, https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2014/10/07/the-notion-of-family/, accessed 30th January 2023

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

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

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

Bischoff, C (2010). Masterpieces of the Picture Gallery. A Brief Guide to the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, https://artsandculture.google.com/asset/young-woman-at-her-toilette-giovanni-bellini/dQE6qBYljWU39A, accessed 1 february 2023

Monet, C (1875) Camille Monet and a Child in the Garden in Argenteuil,[digital image of painting], www.arthistoryproject.com, accessed 31st January 2023

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

Hughes, K (2013). Early Victorian Family Portraits and the Disappearing Mother, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/photography/10475137/Early-Victorian-family-portraits-and-the-disappearing-mother.html, accessed 31st January 2023

‘Hidden Mother Photography’ (2018) Wikepedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hidden_mother_photography, accessed 30th January 2023

Curl, J (2022), Women’s Photography as a Tool of Resistance, https://hyperallergic.com/765431/womens-photography-as-a-tool-of-resistance/, accessed 5 February 2023

Hannah Altman is a Jewish-American artist from New Jersey. She holds an MFA from Virginia Commonwealth University. Her photographs portray lineage, folklore, memory, and narrative. She has recently exhibited with the Virginia Museum of Contemporary Art, Blue Sky Gallery, Filter Photo, and Athens Photo Festival. Her work has been featured in publications including Vanity Fair, Artforum, Huffington Post, and British Journal of Photography. She received the Lensculture Critics’ Choice Award 2021 and the Portraits Hellerau Photography Award 1st Prize 2022. Her photobook Kavana (2020), published by Kris Graves Projects, is in the permanent collections of the MoMa Library and the Metropolitan Museum of Art Thomas J Watson Library. She is the Yale University 2022-23 Blanksteen Artist in Residence at the Slifka Center.

Indoor Voices

By engaging with imagery over the last five years, Altman and her mother have been building Indoor Voices around intergenerational womanhood, matrilineal responsibility, and the symbolism in quiet intimacy. The work is a collaborative discourse of familial and female oriented complexities that makes a testimony to our lineage and experiences as Jewish women. The images explore the process of making by women responsible for their own modes of storytelling. As the project continues, they have constructed more narratives to the mundane and to their lives.

The images are made with consideration to Jewish folklore narrative structures and matrilineal gender performance. As with such stories, they exist uneasily between the realm of truth and the sentimental. As with femininity, aspects of the work are carefully choreographed and orchestrated. This intricate dynamic between the portrayed and the portrayal are central interests for the project. Within every image, and in the relationships between images, there are structures and collapses, strengths and ruins, transformation and stagnancy.

“I think that the certitude of the relationship between my mother and me exists in this overlapping, intangible space, and with this constant assembling and revising, our memory builds in front of us as we photograph it.”

Hannah Altman on “Indoor Voices”

Kavana

The conceptual coupling of photography and memory reaches far back into the medium’s history and how critics, especially Susan Sontag, have thought about photography. Hannah Altman’s book, Kavana, visualizes and affixes the ordinary yet fleeting human phenomena of memory. Focusing specifically on the Jewish understanding of cultural and shared memory, Altman photographed family, traditions, and others as they practiced and participated in Judaism. In Altman’s photographs we see a personalized understanding of memory showcased in her self portraits. The tangible or physical implications of memory can harkened, like the memory of a cut foot being washed in the water.

Portraiture is a critical component in this book, and Altman photographed generations of people. In her artist statement she writes “…when my hand is wounded, I remember other hands. I trace ache back to other aches.” The power of generational memory, such as this, is how it goes deeper than one individual’s life and experience. Altman’s family is here today because of her great grandfather and grandmother’s flight from ethnic cleansing in Poland during the 1930’s. Those in the family who stayed in Poland were murdered in Nazi concentration camps. When Altman photographs personal, familial, or generational memory it moves memory out of the fuzziness associated with the past and into the tangible and consequential reality of the real world. The physical implications of memory loom large in Kavana. Generational memory means that people pass their memories onward and carry them on their skin, in the bones, and within stories.

Symbols and metaphors are a through-line in Kavana. When asked about her work, Altman cites an appreciation for the “misleading simplicity” used to teach complex Jewish ideas in children’s storybooks. The photographs clearly depict actions as they happen before the camera. The photographs do not coldly illustrate a process from a distance. They are thoughtfully lit, composed, and photographed to place the viewer in the room, at the baptismal, and in the doorway with the subjects.
Altman’s photographs show objects and gestures, but leave the viewer with questions.

Altman writes, “To approach an image in this way is not only to ask what it looks like but asks: what does it remember like?” Photographing cultural and generational memory, along with its religious ties presents opportunities for metaphor and symbolism.

Hannah Altman on “Kavana”

Symbols and metaphors are a through-line in Kavana. When asked about her work, Altman cites an appreciation for the “misleading simplicity” used to teach complex Jewish ideas in children’s storybooks. The photographs clearly depict actions as they happen before the camera. The photographs do not coldly illustrate a process from a distance. They are thoughtfully lit, composed, and photographed to place the viewer in the room, at the baptismal, and in the doorway with the subjects. Dipping hands in honey, spitting on an insect, melting candles onto hands, are all scenes clearly rendered by the photographer, though they’re still shrouded in mystery. Why are these actions being undertaken? What do they mean, if anything? Altman’s photographs show objects and gestures, but leave the viewer with questions. The tension between a photograph’s precision and ambiguity was succinctly described decades ago by photography curator and critic John Szarkowski, who wrote, “a photograph describes everything but explains nothing.” This is a major attribute of photography, and it’s the central tension that draws many artists to the medium, including Hannah Altman.

This image is from Hannah Altman’s “Indoor Voices” collection. The tones in this image are warm, with deep orange and brown tones coming from the wall, forming into lighter orange and white tones with the light streaming in from the window slightly to the left. The image clearly uses the rule of thirds – the left third of the image pretty clearly separates the window, creating a blank area of the image to the right. This blank space, to me, was constructed by Altman, and could signify a missing part to their relationship or in their home, and also suggests a particular atmosphere of tranquility or stillness. The middle third features the main focal point, slightly off centre: the two subjects: Hannah Altman herself, and her mother. The fact that the focal point of this image is off centre could connote an unique relationship between the pair, or an unconventional part – this can also be seen by the way the two subjects are posed: Altman, the daughter, stands above her mother in a stereotypical ‘matriarchal’ position, brushing her hair. Her mother sits below, in the place of what would be the child. This reversal of stereotypical ‘mother daughter’ activities creates a unique context in this image, in that of the portrayal of women historically, and the male gaze – historically, the mother is seen to be the caretaker of the child, and has been portrayed in the media for centuries. The way that Hannah Altman creates a reversal of these traditional in these rules creates a unique and important photograph, which speaks to the ‘female gaze’, rather than the historically sexist and male focused portrayal of a traditional family and mother daughter relationship.

This photograph and Hannah Altman’s works are central to my project due to her unconventional portrayal and representation of family relationships between women. This relates closely to my subjects and own life – the context of Altman’s work aligns to what I’m trying to achieve in my project – the identity between generations of women, from their own perspectives.

1. Research a photo-book and describe the story it is communicating  with reference to subject-matter, genre and approach to image-making.

This photobook shows the story of working-class African American families in the Ex – steel mining town of Braddock. This is mainly shown through images of the photographer herself and her family, as well as images of the town itself. Frazier presents the story of her family, through herself, her mother, and her Grandmother as well as other family members. This work also documents the decline of the town’s only hospital, reinforcing the idea that the history of a place is frequently written on the body as well as the landscape. Frazier knowingly acknowledges and expands upon the traditions of classic black-and-white documentary photography, enlisting the participation of her family. This photo book explores “the legacy of racism and economic decline in small towns.” and creates a personal and insightful project that draws both on social context and family history.

2. Who is the photographer? Why did he/she make it? (intentions/ reasons) Who is it for? (audience) How was it received? (any press, reviews, awards, legacy etc.)

Latoya Ruby Frazier was born in 1982 in Braddock, Pennsylvania. Her artistic practice spans a range of media, including photography, video, performance, installation and books, and centres on the nexus of social justice, cultural change, and commentary on the American experience. Her work is held in numerous public collections, including The Museum of Modern Art, New York, Centre George Pompidou, Paris, and the Library of Congress, Washington DC. Frazier is the recipient of many honours and awards including an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from Edinboro University, and an Honorary Doctorate of Fine Arts from Pratt Institute, and a fellowship from the TED fellows, among others.

3. Deconstruct the narrative, concept and design of the book and apply theory above when considering:

Book in hand: how does it feel? Smell, sniff the paper.

The book feels rough and heavy.

Paper and ink: use of different paper/ textures/ colour or B&W or both.

Images in this book are B and W, all printed on the same paper.

Format, size and orientation: portraiture/ landscape/ square/ A5, A4, A3 / number of pages.

A4, square. 158 Pages, with some unlabelled.

Binding, soft/hard cover. image wrap/dust jacket. saddle stitch/swiss binding/ Japanese stab-binding/ leperello

Hardcover.

Cover: linen/ card. graphic/ printed image. embossed/ debossed. letterpress/ silkscreen/hot-stamping.

The cover is linen, with a pattern embossed into the cover. The title is also embossed, in silver lettering.

Title: literal or poetic / relevant or intriguing.

The title “The Notion of Family” is quite poetic to me as it hints at the subject matter, but does not give it away fully. It suggests that the book discusses the nature of family and its’ meaning, making it also intriguing.

Narrative: what is the story/subject matter. How is it told?

This photobook shows the story of working-class African American families in the Ex – steel mining town of Braddock. This is mainly shown through images of the photographer herself and her family, as well as images of the town itself. Frazier presents the story of her family, through herself, her mother, and her Grandmother as well as other family members. This work also documents the decline of the town’s only hospital, reinforcing the idea that the history of a place is frequently written on the body as well as the landscape. All photos are black and white – taken using a film camera. There are landscape images of the town, in between mostly portraits of Frazier and her family members, with some object images also. This book and its’ story is presented by a female – this is important as it shows a perspective in photography that is often silenced or underrepresented. Through this book, Frazier is creating social change.

Structure and architecture: how design/ repeating motifs/ or specific features develops a concept or construct a narrative.

The inclusion of both portraits and images of the town in a varying sequence is important to the narrative. It helps to highlight the subjects’ connectivity to the town and creates a context for the images: this town has influenced the subjects’ lives through the closure of nearby steel mines: and the loss of their livelihood. Using sequencing in this way helps the two parts of the book to link coherently.

Design and layout: image size on pages/ single page, double-spread/ images/ grid, fold-outs/ inserts.

Editing and sequencing: selecting images/ juxtaposition of photographs/ editing process.

Images and text: are they linked? Introduction/ essay/ statement by artists or others.  Use of captions (if any.)