Claude Cahun (also known as Lucy Schwob) was born in Nantes, France, to a middle-class Jewish family in 1894. Lucy Schwob later became Claude Cahun to be gender neutral as an artist and a writer. Claude Cahun was a Surrealist photographer whose work explored gender identity and the subconscious mind, The artist’s self-portrait from 1928 epitomizes her attitude and style, as she stares defiantly at the camera in an outfit that looks neither conventionally masculine nor feminine.
Clare Rae was born in 1981, lives and works in Melbourne, Australia
Clare Rae engages photography, stop motion animation and performance to navigate and defy the limitations of the everyday environments she inhabits. Her works explore gender and identity performance, tension, portraying situations that offer alternative spatial and psychological interactions between the artist and the possibilities that are held in her surrounds. Her practice engages performance and gesture within the photographic field to present an alternate and often awkward experience of subjectivity and the female body, usually the artist’s own.
Here I have put together a couple of different photos taken by Clare Rae
I have collected many different variety of photos which I think would inspire my femininity photoshoot. It has a lot of different views of femininity, for example it shows femininity from both male and
here is my mood board that I have created with the photos I took that was inspired by the collage above. I decided to edit my photos to black and white as it has a more dramatic effect and makes the details and the outline of the body stand out more. I think this looks better as the photo shows emotion.
I will place both of the mirror photos together as these are the only two pictures that I have collected that involves using a mirror as a reflection. I think both of these photos will go well together as they also compliment each other .
I will position all four of the body pictures together to create a squared collage of the different body parts of a female. I will be placing my photos in this layout because even though together they are shaped as a square the layout of the photos look as if its going round in a repeated circle. This represents femininity and masculinity as its an ongoing cycle which always changes. Here’s an example:
I photographed the wall with the black graffiti in the middle because on Frank Hallam Days picture he has black graffiti placed on the left side of the photo and other small writing/ graffiti around it. There is a similarity between the two photos because of the colour scheme for e.g. yellow in the background and between the gaps, black in the graffiti and shadows and then blue and white for details, these colours are really good as they compliment each other well. There is a similarity in the lighting as both look like they have been taken during late afternoon/early evening as both photos are dark but you can still see some light coming from either the street lights or sky. Another similarity is that both photos are taken from eye level instead of bird view or low angle view, however the difference is that Frank Hallam Days photo is of a phone box and mine is a photo of graffiti on the wall. Frank Hallam Days photo is more colourful and vibrant whereas mine is more dull and darker however I can change this is lightroom by bringing the saturation up.
I photographed the wall with black graffiti and edited it on photoshop to make it look like its blurred because Stephanie Jungs photo has been edited to also look like its blurred However Stephanie Jungs photo is taken of people on the streets and mine is of graffiti, Stephanie Jung photo is more dramatic as u cant really see the what she has taken a picture of and mine is more subtle and you can see what I have taken a photo of. The colours used in Stephanie’s picture are yellow, red, green, white, black, blue with hints purple, cream, silver however I only have cream and black.
on photoshop:
selecting my final images:
firstly I flagged the imagines I liked the most
I then coloured the pictures red or green that I was going to use as my final images. green= final images/ red= wasn’t good enough
first image
original:
after:
final outcome:
second image
original:
final outcome:
third image
original:
final outcome:
fourth image
original:
final outcome:
Where I went
To take my photos I walked through town after school when the sun was starting to set, I went to the royal square, millennium, snow hill and a few alleys in town as these places tend to have graffiti, rust and cracks on the buildings. I also went to crowded places but also places with not a lot of people.
here I have circled where I went
What I took pictures of
I took pictures of buildings that was worn down with cracks on it and graffiti on the side of buildings, I took pictures of road signs, streets, cars anything that rusts and doesn’t look that clean.
the photos I took
why I took those pictures
I took these pictures because I think they present what the world actually looks like and how we have had a huge impact on the world.
What I could do better and what went well
With my pictures I feel like I could edit the photos better and go to more places out of town as I feel like I haven’t properly looked into what I was photographing. However I managed to go to the places that consist of graffiti and buildings with rust and cracks on them as this was my goal at the start.
Before
After
For my photoshoot that I’m doing I will be going to run down places and the harbour as these places will have stuff decaying and rusting. I will be using these two photos as inspiration and what I will be trying to aim for. The photos I’m going to take will be of buildings, boats, cars or anything that’s rusting, rotting, breaking or has graffiti on it as this is the theme that Frank Hallam Day was doing. I will then be wondering around town to see if I can find places that’s been abandoned or looks a bit torn down.
