What is identity?

Oxford dictionary states identity is “The fact of being who or what a person or thing is”.

In my opinion labelling someone’s identity as one thing is unfair as identity changes constantly. Your identity is made up of your sense of self which changes daily. How others perceive you which is different for every person in your life as well as you values and actions. Also everything you learn, your experiences and your relationship with others will change all of these factors meaning every day your identity changes. Your identity will be different from when you were younger to now and even if you disagree with me and believe identity is more about physicality like your age or looks it still proves its changing all the time. I wanted to try and capture this and so I looked to find things that change all the time naturally such as the weather, time, plants growing, the sky and the sea.

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Artist Research

Alicja Brodowicz

I took inspiration from Alicja Brodowicz

Alicja Brodowicz is a photographer born in Krakow, Poland in 1977. Her passion for photography started when she began taking photos of her 4 year old daughter and it grew from there to her fine art style influenced greatly by Sally Mann who specialises in thought provoking black and white portrait photographs designed to tell the backstory of the subject, along with Anders Petersen a popular black and white portrait photographer with 30 published books and won The Arles Photography of the year award in 2003. Around 90% of Brodowicz pictures are in black and white in a very abstracted style. She started the project Visual Exercises in 2018/2019 and spent months planning. She stated she usually does not plan before photographs but had the for this conceptual project.

Conceptually, Brodowicz uses the mirror method of representing reality of her own thought process and ideas of how humanity reflects nature. This was what inspired my idea of how identity also reflects nature through change and I wanted to capture this aspect in a similar mode of photography however I personalised the images by keeping many of them in colour as I prefer to take photos in colour as I feel it adds more depth and I want to appreciate how vibrant everything is and our ability to see this.

Technical

The lighting on the tree bark I can assume is natural lighting as the image is bright and trees are usually outdoors. I could guess however that the image of the person is in a studio due to the extreme shadows. The image is in sharp focus. There is a range of tones from dark to light due to the shadows and the bright sections of the image.

Visual

The image is in black and white however there is still drastic change of tones within both images. There is obviously a lot of texture within the image also as both photos are zoomed in capturing the creases and rivets in the bark and skin. The shape is quite 3D as the texture shows how the depth of field is different depending on where you’re looking in the image.

Contextual

This image was taken as a part of her Visual Exercises project

Conceptual

I think Brodowicz has taken this image to show the strength in the subject by aligning the with the sturdiness and strength of a tree.

Cindy Sherman

I was also inspired by American photographer Cindy Sherman’s work and specifically her style of editing and her use of colour and black and white. Sherman was born in New Jersey US 1954. She began her photography journey in 1972 when she enrolled in at the State University of New York in painting before swapping her subject for photography. Her most recent work consisting of photos taken from 2010- 2023 was published with FT Weekend Magazine in 2023 originally intended to be used as an abstract wallpaper setting designed so that from a distance you can’t tell what it is however when you’re up close you can tell they’re pieces of different facial expressions.

Sherman specifically takes photos of herself but challenges this stating that you will never find the real her amongst the images as she plays roles and acts characters using props and wigs. I believe her work is to represent how unsettling the idea of a woman’s value being based off of her physical appearance. She is known to take on different identities in her photography and use the art to evade her true personality which I think corresponds to how our true identities are always hanging and don’t necessarily rely on our physical appearance as looks can be deceiving and therefore shows how others perceive you isn’t defining.

Technical

The lighting is unnatural as it looks to be taken in a studio as the lighting is even throughout all the images which is hard to replicate with natural lighting. The sticker effect adds to the depth of field as it looks closer to the camera. The image is in sharp focus. There is a range of tones within the image.

Visual

There is so colour as the image is in black and white however the shadows and highlights in the image add to the different tones. The wrinkles in the skin adds to the texture and lines in the image a long with the netting used to frame her face and the way the hair is brushed back. The image looks to be more 2D because of the style of creative editing. There isn’t any patterns I can spot in this photo.

Contextual

This image was taken as a part of her Untitled Film Stills project.

Conceptual

I think this image is used to demonstrate Sherman’s views on society’s beauty standards and she exaggerates the image to look ridiculous in order to show how unachievable the standard is. The stickers stand out to show this standard is not a part of her however they blend well in tone to express how they’ve been moulded onto her through her upbringing and society’s forced ideals.

Some other ideas I found online:

My Best Edited Images

In this photoshoot I tried to look at rain and the sky for the natural elements that change frequently, as well as grass as its growing always. To do this I used a mirror and poured water on it to replicate the look of rain. I also thought to use a mirror to try to capture the idea of self reflection which is another part of identity.

Technical

The lighting in this image is natural/daylight as the image was taken outside. I used max aperture.

The shutter speed is it doesn’t look to be over or under exposed. F/ is 6.7 and the ISO is 800. The white balance was on Auto.

Visual

I kept the colour from the original image and heightened it only slightly as I felt they were quite vibrant as they were. The tone is both light and dark I feel as the image itself was taken in a bright setting however uses dark elements such as the shadows in the grass and cool toned colours. There is a lot of texture I believe in this image as the grass adds to it as well as the smoothness of the mirror a long with the wrinkles in her jacket. The mirror also contributes by adding the 2D flat shape contrasting with the length and form (3D) of the grass. The leading line of the arm adds to the image drawing the viewers eyes up to the subjects morphed ad blurred face. There is also 3D concept within this image as the mirror on the ground gives a sense of a door way or window making the image look more 3D.

Contextual

There isn’t much surrounding knowledge or historical things to know as I took this image recently making it modern. In this image I used the mirror effect within photography meaning I built my own ideas into reality it didn’t naturally occur as I interfered by constructing reality to create surrealism within the image.

Conceptual

The meaning behind this image was to create an allusion of a window in the ground as well as capture the sky to link back to my nature within humans concept. I blurred the image to make the face distorted to have the viewer interpret it differently and to have to really look into the image and its surroundings to try to understand it based on what they know which ultimately is what identity is as its more than what you first assume at face-value.

Technical

The lighting in this image is natural/daylight as the image was taken outside. I used max aperture.

The shutter speed is it doesn’t look to be over or under exposed. F/ is 6.7 and the ISO is 800. The white balance was on Auto.

Visual

This picture is in black and white and therefore the colours are very muted. The image has quite dark tones to it as there is a lot of shadow created by the blades of grass however her eyes above the mirror look to be light as the dark grass contrasts with her fair skin. There is a lot of texture in this image as the grass adds texture as well as her hair the fabric of her jeans and jacket. There isn’t much shape involved in the image except how I asked the model to extend their left leg to create leading lines. The shape in the image isn’t even and therefore adds depth to the image as her leg is further in frame than the rest of her as well as the mirror giving a 3D concept.

Contextual

In this image I used the mirror effect within photography meaning I built my own ideas into reality it didn’t naturally occur as I interfered by constructing reality to create surrealism within the image.

Conceptual

I took this image this way to convey how peoples experiences and their environment also add to their inner identity. The mirror represents how its looking into her and I asked the subject to look scared and hide behind the mirror as well as editing it to be in black and white to give a dark uneasiness to the image possibly foreshadowing her dark history to have the viewer use their imagination when seeing this image and think for themselves about what its trying to portray the way we can’t know the reasons behind someone being the way they are and it could be down to things they have been through in life.

I tried this image in both B&W and colour as I’m not sure which one suits it better

Technical

The lighting in this image is natural/daylight as the image was taken outside. I used max aperture.

The shutter speed is it doesn’t look to be over or under exposed. F/ is 6.7 and the ISO is 800. The white balance was on Auto.

Visual

The coloured version is very light and has a range of warm and cool toned colours. the tone is light overall though there are some dark shadows within it. The water droplets as well as the models wispy hair adds texture. The image has a more 3D appearance due to the water droplets adding height to the mirror affect. The grass also adds to the 3D as it protrudes over the edge of the mirror making the mirror look like its party of the ground and it frames the image too. There isn’t many lines within the image other than the edge of the mirror and the blades of grass pointing to the models face.

Contextual

Conceptual

The idea behind this image was to try and capture the idea of rain and link it back to the idea of identity changing naturally and finding things that change in nature the same as the water cycle and the weather.

Technical

The lighting is both natural and artificial as the natural light is coming in through the window but there was also lights above the subject when taking the image. the Aperture used was max. The f stop was f/6.7. The exposure time was 1/90. The ISO used was ISO-100 and the White Balance was on Auto.

Visual

The colours are natural in this image

Contextual

Conceptual

I did this to show how your choices of reality in its natural form can impact your identity and what your ideas of your own sense of self and you might not even realise it which is why the subject is not looking at herself in the mirror and reflecting instead the subject is distracted by what’s surrounding her. I also didn’t focus on the subject themselves but on the water on the mirror instead to add to this point of loosing yourself by what’s happening around you.

My Alicja Brodowicz and Cindy Sherman Inspired Images

Other Images

In the next shoot I tried to capture the lines naturally drawn over the human body such as finger prints and veins.

I think fingerprints are a huge sign of identity as every one is is different and unique. the same way people are. Even identical twins finger prints are different showing how every individuals identity is different and unique.

Femininity

Femininity for me is a feeling rather than a look or a style. For me femininity is feeling empowered and confident and aligning yourself with being a woman. Femininity is being creative and passionate and in my opinion is not defined by clothes or your physical appearance however I do believe make up or certain clothes might help you feel more feminine on the outside as well as inside. I used the symbolism of femininity of flowers throughout my photoshoots and the colour pink. I wanted to focus my photoshoot less on the physical appearance of a “girl” ad instead on the feeling of femininity and the idea of “girlhood”.

Girlhood being the sense of kinship a group of girls can bring by girls supporting other girls. The growing up with and relating to other girls going through the same things and being inspired by one another.

Another idea I had was the comparison of modern day femininity versus femininity in previous times and how social media effects peoples perception of femininity.