For my exam project, I will focus on looking at the theme of SIMPLE OR COMPLEX by taking images that relate to the sublime – an emotion defined by terror, ecstasy and sheer beauty. In order to capture the sublime within my images, I will turn my camera on the woodlands around my home, with my images aiming to display an innate feeling of danger, while simultaneously showing the beauty of the natural landscape.
I will take a range of images including close up shots, as well as more grandiose landscape images that relate closer to the feeling of the sublime (this linking with the COMPLEX side of the initial project theme). For these images, I will take inspiration from Chrystel Lebas’ work, as her work (specifically her woodland images) give off a sense of danger and beauty in the way I would also like to capture in my images. I think this sense of danger would add to the idea of the sublime and, with nature being forefront in the sublime anyway, settings such as a woodland would be a good way to capture the idea of the sublime.
As for the close up images, I would like to explore the idea of the Golden Ratio that can be seen all throughout nature, linking human concepts of mathematics (Fibonacci) with nature. I would also like to explore still-life/object photography by collecting objects from the natural woodland and photographing them in a home-made studio in the style of Talbot’s fern images or a cyanotype image created by Anna Atkins (linking with the SIMPLE side). I like the look of these images as they appear fairly simple and have a level of detail (as well as a somewhat abstract look) that gives them complexity. I will also take images during the blue hour, in order to further my knowledge and skills of taking night photographs.
An artist with a similar approach but different outcome would be Karl Blossfeldt, whose work captures natural form and shape in objects such as flowers and other plants in a formal, yet alluring manner.
After I have taken my images I will explore the use of AI software such as Dall-E or Midjourney to recreate my own images. This will diversify my images (not only within this project, but also with my images from previous projects) and juxtapose the idea of taking images of an ancient setting such as the woodland with the use of modern software to recreate them. I will research the AI software so I can make better use of them later in the project. The use of AI would also link to the complexity of the software itself, linking back to the main theme of the project.
