Born in Glen Ridge, New Jersey, in 1954, Sherman graduated from the state university of New York buffalo and very quickly rose to fame with her work in art.

Cindy Sherman’s photography is very clearly focussed on the topic of female stereotypes. She regularly alters her appearance beyond recognition through makeup, prosthetics, and costumes. To create her images, she assumes the multiple roles of photographer, model, makeup artist, hairdresser, and stylist. She becomes the character in the story she is attempting to portray through her images.

Many people have perceived Sherman’s photography to be uncomfortable creepy, or even terrifying since we see the depicted woman in a vulnerable position. a few of her photos show herself with her back to the camera which can also be an example of vulnerability as it could be seen as someone watching her and she doesn’t know.

What impact did she cause to photography or society?

Cindy Sherman’s photography is important because of the way it depicted how women are viewed in society. The exploration of identity, gender, and representation have inspired countless artists and photographers to up level and push boundaries when nit came to their own artwork.

In this particular photo, we can see a woman stood alone on the roadside with her luggage beside her. It was usual for Sherman to create black and white photos since that was the option for her to start her photography with. in this photo, the black and white gives an extra ominous feeling to the image. Sherman often created photos that focussed on vulnerability and in this photo it can be seen. the use of her showing her back to the camera could make the viewer feel uncomfortable as if she doesn’t know someone is watching her.

The lighting/exposure of the camera and the use of her brighter clothes has made her stand out to the rest of the image and contrast with the darkness of the sky. I think this is very effective as it makes her the obvious main focus of the image. This idea can also be taken from the use of space in the image. She is not in a crowed small area, she is in an open space alone which would create more tension for the viewer.

In this photo, I could be interpreted by the viewer that Sherman is impersonating a house wife. This can be clear by the objects she adds to the image to subtly create this thought. the use of the pan and soap bottle suggest to the viewer that she could be pictured in a kitchen. as well as this, she is also wearing an apron.

As well as the last image, the black and white can also cause an ominous feeling or sense of tension and the tone of the image makes it feels like a dark and scary moment for the woman. she can be seen to be looking over her shoulder and the viewer can interpret that to what they like but it was usually be a negative thing she may be looking at. Sherman is also seen holding her stomach which could be a usual comfort for a woman so this could further suggest something to make her uncomfortable is going on and further shows how she depicts the theme of vulnerability in her photos.

Femininity-

The definition of femininity is the qualities or attributes regarded as characteristic of women or girls.

What does it mean to be Female?

Many people how different perspectives on what it means to be female. for example someone has said:

“To me, being a woman means overcoming adversity. It is strength and empowerment. It is black and white, cis and trans, straight and queer, native and immigrant, disabled and poor and Jewish and Muslim and fat and all-inclusive. What I’m trying to say is being a woman is whatever you want it to be.” -Sarah Emily Baum

Many people share that being a woman does not have a definition since it can be perceived in many different ways for many different people.

What themes do you associate with Femininity, Feminine or female?

What would you say are the assumed norms of Femininity today?

The assumed norms of a female are usually the opposites of what the norms of male is. for example, Females are seen to be accommodating and emotional, while men are usually expected to be self-confident and aggressive. As well as this, occupation also plays a large role. Women are more expected to take part in jobs such as teachers or nurses and not jobs that would suit men Physical appearance is also important, Men and women are also expected to dress and groom in ways that are stereotypical to their gender so women are stereotypically associated with make up and dresses and not, for example, muscular

Nowadays, the stereotypes are more flexible and there isn’t any set rules for what a woman can be. Since extreme gender stereotypes are harmful as they don’t allow people to fully express themselves and their emotions, it is now encouraged for people to just be themselves and not expected to follow the stereotypes.

Compare expectations and perceptions of Femininity through time, society and place

Have we reached a point where the public thinks that men and women should have equal roles in the workplace and at home? Or is there still a perception that there should be a gender divide?

In the past, it was usual for gender roles to say that a man’s job is to earn money and a woman’s job is to look after the home and family. Many people accepted the gender role divide and it was a social norm for them. In 1987, a third (36 per cent) of the public thought that most women would prioritise their caring role over having a job. Though this percentage belief hasn’t changed a drastic amount, since many woman still has the expectation of having a family one day, it has still changed enough to show that Women have gained more rights when it comes to working

Femininity in Photography
Many female photographers use it to capture women’s unique beauty. Female photographers also use their work to write and highlight the female experience. These photographers create a photographic record of women’s struggles, triumphs, and everyday adventures.

Masculinity–

The definition of masculinity is the qualities or attributes regarded as characteristic of men or boys.

What does it mean to be Male?

Being male can have as many struggles as it can to be female. men have also shared their own takes on the gender.

“Being a man to me means being unapologetically you. It means not being afraid to show the world who you are, exactly as you are. Being a man is never being afraid to show your emotions” Stevie, 26

“For me, being a man is about self-discovery, building self-awareness, emotional intelligence and most importantly, my legacy.” Jack, 22

What themes do you associate with the words masculine, masculinities or male? 

What would you say are the assumed norms of Masculinity today?

Masculine norms are mostly opposite to the feminine norms. Current Dominant Masculine Norms include providing for others, physical strength, emotional toughness, self-reliance, competitiveness, risk taking, protector, toughness and aggression, competitiveness, winning, dominance (including sexual), virility, control, power, heroism, honour and courage.

It is also a general norm for males to take more important jobs such as a doctor, pilot or engineer.

Recently, the stereotypes are more flexible and there isn’t any set rules for what a male can be.

Masculinity in Photography

What is Masculinity?

Masculinity is common traits, attributes and characteristics of men and boys for example the most prominent ones would be things like the colour blue or even jobs such as mechanic.

what is Femininity?

just like masculinity femininity is attributes and characteristics that are more common throughout women that you would really see men do examples of this could be using make up or working as a nurse.

what is the definition of identity?

identity is the qualities, beliefs, personality traits, appearance, and/or expressions that characterize a person or a group. Identity emerges during childhood as children start to comprehend their self-concept, and it remains a consistent aspect throughout different stages of life.

someone’s identity can link to many different things but peoples culture is a big thing when talking about who you identify as and who you are. things like religion and race is what I would consider as one of the main things when talking about your cultural identity but things such as gender age and other things are obviously your identity.

for example one of the biggest cultural identity’s in the world is Christianity as its the most followed religions in the world with 2.4 billion followers.

(common Christian church)

social identity is a concept of who you are in public, work or even with your friends. this can be influenced by things people do or say that people see online or even when they are out in public. a popular/trendy identity that has grown in the UK is roadmen. stereotypically roadmen are usually dressed in all black, they are also known for having a postcode war which is a where a group of people feel like they need to defend there area from the other people around them.

social identity can also be shown through what you wear (streetwear, fashion etc). this can give people an insight on who you are.

a good example would be bloke core which has really been popularised in the UK over the years

geographical identity, is when someone has an attachment to their country region or city. this is shown in jersey through the jersey post with its dedicated pages to sporting events throughout the island. and through social media from pages such as sports cast jersey

peoples identity’s can be formed through their upbringing with parents and siblings. as they are constantly around family so they pick up on personality traits and the way people speak or look. so people essentially become mini versions of there parents

Cindy Sherman

The art historical canon was heavily criticized for its lack of female artists and widespread use of stereotypical images of women. Some female artists began to use their work as a means of re-representing female identity and deconstructing prevailing cultural expectations of femininity. One of these was contemporary artists Cindy Sherman who, in her photographs, takes on the role of many female identities found throughout Western culture. These photographs portray struggles over women’s identity and the way we come to know and understand ourselves through culture, and can be critically analysed using feminist social constructionist theories that challenge the idea of a fixed femininity.

In Sherman’s Hollywood-like stills, she alters her identity using filmmaking tools such as costume, lighting, setting and composition

Sherman deliberately gave up the conventions of fashion photography, causing French vogue to ultimately reject the works for their magazine. However, other fashion editors and designers received her works enthusiastically.

In this photo it shows a woman in the kitchen, this is stereotyped as femininity as women were stereotyped to cook and care for themselves and the family etc. This would show challenging femininity in the 20th century because of how the woman is photographed. The shopping bag is ripped on the floor and the woman is picking it up.

Claude Cahun

Claude Cahun, born Lucy Schwob was a French surrealist photographer, sculptor, and writer. Lucy took to the name, Claude Cahun in 1914. Cahun is best known as a writer and self-portraitist, who assumed a variety of performative personae

Cahun’s connection with Jersey began early, with childhood holidays spent in Jersey and Brittany. She was born Lucy Schwob in Nantes, France to a wealthy Jewish family. But in her late teens and early twenties Cahun had been looking for a new, gender-neutral name for a while. She fixed on the name Claude Cahun in 1918. At that time she was in a same-sex relationship with Suzanne Malherbe, who used the name Marcel Moore. They had become step sisters in their mid-teens and at some point a closer relationship developed.

 Initially they found life in Jersey to be a ‘holiday without end.’ But with the prospect of a Nazi invasion of Jersey looking very likely in 1940, they refused to be evacuated back to England. Instead the women decided to mount an underground resistance campaign following the Nazi’s occupation of the Island in June 1940. Their campaign largely took the form of propaganda in the form of fake news sheets, authored by listening to the BBC on an illegal radio and then translated into German by Moore. These were left in places German soldiers might find them.

Cahun and Moore ended up in prison in St Helier and narrowly avoided a sentence of death. They remained in jail until 9 May 1945, the day Jersey was liberated. in late 1954, Cahun was taken into hospital and died on 8 December, aged 60. Moore lived on in Jersey until 1972, when she ended her own life.

This photograph to me, represents the challenge of normality of identity in the 20th century. I find this photo the most intriguing, as Claude Cahun shaved her head to challenge the gender roles and show her own way of self expression. In this photo Claude Cahun is presented in a very masculine way, the way she had positioned herself is very a very masculine pose but the patterned clothes and mirror add a feminine vibe to a masculine photo. The way she has positioned herself next to the mirror looking into the camera with the mirror reflecting her eyes to look away could add to the stereotype that men are confident and will look straight into your eyes and that women are more shy, timid and less confident than men.

Shannon O’Donnell

Background: Shannon is a talented individual who completed her A level studies and continued with a passion for photography and in fact has recently completed her BA (Hons), a degree in documentary photography at the university of South Wales. Her age and birth date is unknown as there is no evidence of that type of information.

During her 3-year degree, she developed a number of projects based around gender identities and constructions. Her work is quite known and in fact has a certain uniqueness and depth to it.

Shannon is an amazing artist. She approached her work with a performative approach where she explores the gendered experience which are both personal and within contemporary and historical capitalist Britain. Shannon has a variety of ways she shows her art, she presents her art through things like, audio, text, archival research, moving stills and of course photography. She was the former Digitisation and Outreach Coordinator at the Société Jersiaise Photographic Archive and current Digitisation and Cataloguing Officer at Jersey Heritage

Photo case study

Claude Cahun

Background Claude Cahun was born in 25th of October 1894, Lucy Schwob in Nantes, France into a wealthy jewish family. Cahun was incredible, not only was she an artist but she was a photographer and writer. She is best known for her unique self portraits where she creates a range of personas, some include, weight lifter, doll and aviator. Cahun explored and questioned gender, identity and subconscious of mind, particularly position of women. She did this through her art and in the way she spent her life.

Later, in her late teens/early twenties, Cahun had been looking for a gender neutral name. Soon she changed her name to Claude Cahun in 1918.

Claude, soon moved to Jersey Channel Island, with her lover, Marcel Moore and her stepsister. Suddenly she was imprisoned and sentenced to death in 1944, accused of activities in the resistance during the occupations. Luckily, Cahun survived and nearly reached to the point where she was forgotten until in the 1980s where she started to be recognised, once again for her art. Lots of Cahun and her lovers work was destroyed by the Nazis due to them requisitioning their home.

Unfortunately, Cahun died in 1954 from ill health. It was rumoured that her time in captivity in German might have been partially to blame for her death. Later, Cahun lover, Moore killed herself in 1972. Both Cahun and Moore are peacefully buried together in St Brelade’s churchyard.

Photo case study:

Nan Goldin

Nan Goldin, full name Nancy Goldin who was born September 12, 1953 is an American photographer and activist. Her work regularly explores moments of intimacy, LGBT subcultures, and the opioid epidemic, and the HIV/AIDS crisis.

Nan is an outsider by instinct and said to be nocturnal by nature and someone who lives on the edge of society where she creates her own rules. She revealed herself and name in the 1980s, visually recording her own stubborn life, and the often promiscuous lives of her circle of friends, which it included characters like addicts, hustlers, transvestites and prostitutes. Because of this, she redefined photography.

Cindy Sherman

Cindy Sherman, real name Cynthia Morris Sherman, is an iconic self portrait photographer who famously became known due to her untitled film still, which was produced in 1977-80, where she put of guises and photographed herself in multiple different settings and resembled the mid 20th-century B movies.

She was always interested in identity as she stated that “I wish I could treat every day as halloween, and get dressed up and go out into the world as some eccentric character”

She probed the contractions of identity where she often played with visual and cultural codes of art, celebrity, gender and photography.

Shannon O’Donnell

Shannon is a women who completed A level studies and continued with a passion for photography and in fact has recently completed her BA (Hons), a degree in documentary photography at the university of South Wales.

During her 3-year degree she developed a number of projects based around gender identities and constructions.

Claude Cahun

Claude Cahun was born in 1894, Lucy Schwob in Nantes, France into a wealthy jewish family. Cahun was the whole package, she was an artist, photographer and writer. Till this day, she is known for her surreal self-portrait photography where she dressed up as different types of characters. Cahun explored and questioned gender, identity and subconscious of mind, particularly position of women. She did this through her art and in the way she spent her life.

Later, in her late teens/early twenties, Cahun had been looking for a gender neutral name. Soon she changed her name to Claude Cahun in 1918.

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