Femininity

Masculinity

The music industry is male dominated, with women and non-male artists often facing challenges in the major roles like production, song writing and leadership. Women make up only a small part of producers and engineers, not because of a lack of talent, but due to stereotyping and gatekeeping.

Sexism is still a big issue, with women often dealing with stereotypes, double standards, and even harassment. They’re judged more on appearance and personal lives than their male counterparts, which limits there creative freedom.

Despite the challenges, progress is happening. Groups like Women in Music are pushing for change, and more women are breaking into leadership and production roles. But to truly balance the scales, the industry needs to prioritize inclusivity and fairness at all levels.

Going into this project I had the idea of getting both a girl and a boy to play and create music side by side to show what it would look like if there was a ideal fifty fifty divide within the industry and that both men and women can both create music.

Here are the original photos.

I had decided to do some creative editing to them to make the photos more wacky as if they were album covers.

Here was my reference of some out there album covers that I put together myself with the album that has a red arrow pointing to it being my own cover.

Here are the album covers that I made from my images.

For this one, this album by “Tv Girl” titled “Who Really Cares” was my main inspiration, it uses pink and blue to represent masculinity and femininity.

I then took both of my same models for another shoot and decided to use pink and blue lighting to represent femininity and masculinity, when using the pink light I would have my female model sit closer to it and the camera, meaning she would be the main focus of the shot, I did this to represent one gender overpowering something, in this instance the music industry, I also did the same with my male model and a blue light.

This was the unedited outcome.

This is the edited outcome.

Identity is anything that makes you unique, what represents you and what is personal to you, this could be something going on within your life such as being in hospital all the way to something as simple as your gender.

Masculinity

The idea of masculinities refers to the position of men in the gender order. Whitehead and Barrett explain that: Masculinities are those behaviours, languages and practices, existing in specific cultural and organisational locations, which are commonly associated with men, thus culturally defined as not feminine

Femininity

Femininity (also called womanliness) is a set of attributes, behaviors, and roles generally associated with women and girls. Femininity can be understood as socially constructed, and there is also some evidence that some behaviours considered feminine are influenced by both cultural factors and biological factors

Where you live and the environment around you shape who you are.

• Culture and Community: Your traditions, language, and sense of belonging often come from where you grow up.
• Opportunities: Wealthy or poor areas can influence how you see yourself and your future.
• City or Nature: Living in a busy city or close to nature can shape your lifestyle and values.
• Big Changes: Moving, migration, or tough events like disasters can shift your identity.
• Safety and Freedom: Safe places let you be yourself, while unsafe ones might make you cautious.
• Online Life: The internet also shapes how you see yourself and connect with others.

In short, your environment helps define who you are and how you see the world.

Cindy Sherman is an American artist and photographer known for creating powerful portraits where she transforms herself into different characters. Her work explores themes of identity, gender, and how society shapes the roles people play.

Her most famous series, Untitled Film Stills, features her posing as women from old Hollywood-style movies, highlighting familiar but stereotypical female roles. Later, her work became darker and more surreal, using props, mannequins, and strange costumes to explore themes like beauty, aging, and human fragility.

Sherman is considered one of the most important artists of her time, with her work displayed in major museums worldwide. Her art challenges us to think about who we are and how much of our identity is shaped by outside forces.

Cindy Sherman’s art challenges the way we think about femininity and masculinity by showing that gender roles are like costumes we put on, not fixed parts of who we are.

Femininity

• Questioning Stereotypes: In her famous Untitled Film Stills, she dresses as characters like housewives, movie stars, and “damsels in distress” — roles often seen in old films. By doing this, she highlights how society expects women to fit into certain “types.”
• Challenging Beauty Standards: Later, her work features creepy, aging, or distorted figures, forcing us to question society’s obsession with youth, beauty, and perfection in women.
• Exposing Society’s Gaze: Her work makes us think about how women are often seen as objects to be looked at, especially in media. By controlling how she’s seen, Sherman flips this power dynamic.

Masculinity

• Power and Control: While she focuses more on femininity, Sherman also critiques masculinity. Some of her later works feature clownish, exaggerated “masculine” figures that highlight how fragile and performative power can be.
• Gender as Performance: By using wigs, makeup, and costumes to switch between “male” and “female” roles, she shows that masculinity, like femininity, is just another role people play.

This is a piece that is part of her collection

“This is how I look I guess”

Sherman’s work reveals that gender roles aren’t natural they’re performances shaped by media and culture, this shows especially within this piece. Her art encourages us to think about how much of our identity is real and how much is something we’ve been taught to “act out.”

In this piece she shows very few distinctive feminine aspects and masculine aspects, a very obvious feminine aspect which you can see is her big lips with lipstick on, this is linked primarily to females.

The pieces within the collection all have a creepy look to them, it is people with aged and wrinkly skin with photos of overly feminine lips and different eyes placed over the original photo.

This whole collection is about Cindy Sherman reclaiming her self image, social media encourages people to show flawless and perfect versions of themselves, Sherman takes control in her own way. Her weird, distorted self-portraits fight back against beauty standards, showing that self-expression doesn’t have to be done in a certain way and to society’s standards.

Claude Cahun was born October 25th 1894 in France and passed away December 8th 1954 in the Jersey Channel Islands, Claude was a French artist known for their surreal self-portraits and exploration of gender identity. They challenged traditional ideas of gender, often presenting themselves as both masculine and feminine or somewhere in between. Their photos featured costumes, masks, and striking poses, experimenting with ideas of identity and self-expression.

Claude was also part of the anti-Nazi resistance during World War II, they created anti-German propaganda with their romantical partner, Marcel Moore who was there step sister/siblings. Though their work was mostly forgotten after their death, it was rediscovered in the 1980s and is now seen as a key influence in queer art and gender theory not just in Jersey but around the world.

Claude Cahuns birth name was Lucy Renée Mathilde Schwob, they later adopted the name Claude Cahun to reflect their rejection of gender norms, as “Claude” is a gender-neutral name in French. Claude Cahuns birth name was Lucy Renée Mathilde Schwob, they later adopted the name Claude Cahun to reflect their rejection of gender norms, as “Claude” is a gender-neutral name in French.

Claude’s work was made in order to break gender normality’s showing it could be fluid and ever-changing, it was self expression and a rebellion to the do’s and don’ts not just against gender norms, but also against authority and oppression, they also made some pieces to resist the Nazis during World War II as there partner Marcel Moore was trying to resist the Nazi occupation, it was done with the hope of inspiring others to think freely about who they are and what they stand for.

To do this Claude used self-portraits to challenge ideas about identity and gender. They dressed up in costumes, masks, and bold poses, combining masculine and feminine looks in order to show that identity isn’t fixed at birth.

By constantly changing their appearance, Claude sent a message that who we are isn’t set in stone. Their photos did end up encouraging loads of people globally to question social norms and see identity as something they should and could create for themselves.

This is a satellite photo of Jersey Channel Islands

Claude lived on the island of Jersey during World War II with their partner Marcel Moore. They joined the anti-Nazi resistance, creating secret leaflets to mock and discourage German soldiers.

Claude and Moore were arrested and sentenced to death but were freed when the war ended. Today, they are remembered on Jersey for their bravery and resistance against the Nazis.

This is a piece by Claude Cahun called “Me Myself and I”

**Simple Analysis of Claude Cahun’s “Me, Myself and I” **

Claude Cahun’s “Me, Myself and I” explores identity as fluid and ever-changing. Instead of presenting a single, fixed self, Cahun portrays the self as multiple, complex, and shifting. This directly challenges traditional ideas of gender and personal identity.

Key Themes

1. Multiplicity of Self: The title suggests that “self” isn’t singular. Cahun shows different versions of themselves, reflecting how identity is layered and changeable.
2. Gender Fluidity: Cahun rejected fixed gender roles, often presenting as both masculine and feminine—or neither. They famously said, “Neuter is the only gender that always suits me.”
3. Surrealist Aesthetic: Cahun used costumes, props, and masks to question reality and identity. This links to surrealist ideas about the subconscious and dreams.
4. Self as Performance: Like wearing costumes on a stage, Cahun shows that identity is something we “perform” rather than something fixed or natural.

Cahun’s work remains influential today, inspiring modern ideas about gender fluidity, drag culture, and self-expression in art​

“Rembrandt lighting” is a lighting technique used alongside “Butterfly lighting” it is distinct by an illuminated triangle and can be achieved by using one or two lights alongside a reflector.

I ended up going to the studio again and took some more Rembrandt photos in different styles of lighting.

Rembrandt was a Dutch painter

He was known for his amazing ability to show human feelings in his art. He used light and shadow in a unique way that made his paintings look real and full of life.

Born in the Netherlands, Rembrandt started drawing and painting at a young age. He later moved to Amsterdam, where he became a popular artist, painting portraits for wealthy people. But unlike other artists, Rembrandt showed people as they really were, not just how they wanted to be seen.

He also painted himself many times, showing how he changed as he got older — from a young, confident man to an older, wiser person who had faced hard times. These self-portraits are still seen as some of the most honest in art history.

Even when he went through struggles with money and personal loss, Rembrandt never stopped creating. His later works are seen as some of his best, showing deep understanding and emotion. Today, he is remembered as one of the greatest artists of all time, known for capturing the true human experience.

Portrait of an old man

Portrait of an Old Man is a famous painting by Rembrandt, made around 1654. It shows an old man with a calm, thoughtful look. He has a long white beard, wrinkled skin, and wears a simple robe and cap, making him look wise and peaceful.

Rembrandt used light and shadow to make the man’s face stand out. Soft light shines on his face, showing every wrinkle and detail, while the background stays dark. This makes the man feel real and present, almost like he’s sitting right in front of you.

No one knows for sure who the man is. Some people think he wasn’t a real person but just someone Rembrandt painted to show age and wisdom.

Today, this painting is seen as one of Rembrandt’s best. People love how he captured the man’s age, experience, and quiet strength, making it a powerful example of how art can show the beauty of being human.

My photos

I ended up going to the studio to attempt Rembrandt lighting myself

Here are all my raw photos

I then edited some of my best photos in Lightroom and photoshop.

Environmental portraits are portraits taken in the subjects usual environment, they highlight and bring attention to there life and everything going on around them, environmental portraits are a genre of photography.

The goal of these photos is to capture somebody’s everyday life, what they like to do and there personality traits (you could control there facial expression to show this)

Evaluating the key features of this photo

The photo has artificial lighting coming from above.

The photos environment is a reception desk at a rich place of work, we can tell its a wealthy place of work because the frame of the painting.

The framing is a half body angle and taken dead pan.

The approach taken was to have the guy pull a neutral face giving him a nonchalant serious feel.

The gaze of the photo is the guy making direct eye contact with camera, engagement with the photo.

The camera settings are wide lens with mid-range f stop and a low ISO.

Alfred Krupp

Alfred Krupp is a revolutionary inventor, worth roughly a billion dollars in the 1960s, Arnold Newman (a Jewish photographer) is a well known environmental portrait photographer, the photo Arnold took of the inventor Alfred was used to preserve his legacy and became a iconic piece of work.

This portrait was taken on July 6 1963, using a wide angle lens, the lighting is weird and eerie with a green tinge that makes the subject appear to be a evil/not nice person.

When Newman and Krupp first spoke, Krupp was racist to Newman after finding out he was a Jew and wouldn’t let him create the photo, Newman ended up eventually convincing Krupp to let him take it by having him look at his portfolio, after how poorly Krupp treated Newman, Newman used the photo to make Krupp look as evil as possible.

This is a environmental photo I took of two pupils working in the studio, shooting a cover for there poster.

After taking some photos I decided to put them in Lightroom and see what I could do with the.

With this photo I shifted the perspective off it by using the transform feature in Lightroom.

I used the colour grading wheel to shift the original colour of the image completely, I chose random colours that went well together to create a weird abstract feel in the photos and because I chose bright and vibrant colours which gave the photo a happy vibe to it, I also put grain on the photo because I find it aesthetically pleasing and enjoy the retro look it gives the photos.

This photo is a portrait of me

Yet again I decided to put random colours on it and added grain to change the texture of the photo giving it a vintage feel, I also cropped out all the unneeded background space to make me the main subject of the photo.

We took this photo of me walking with a very scenic background.

When editing this photo I made the midpoint dark blue, which gave the photo a cold feeling to it.

Me and my group decided to use loads of different sheets of coloured see through plastic and hold it over the spotlight in the studio to therefore change the colour of the light, we did a photoshoot experimenting with each of the different colours to then discover what our favourite was.

This was pink.

This was Purple.

This was blue.

This was Red.

We decided that red was our favourite colour and took our best photos using the red light, here’s them unedited.

we did a experiment with the ISO (sensitivity to light) using paper as our subject, we used a range of ISO’s to be able to clearly see a difference between the photos.

This photo has a low ISO, we also used a dark see through piece of plastic to give us a brownish tint to the photo which we did for these next two photos as well as we found it to be aesthetically pleasing.

This photo has a medium ISO, you can clearly see the subject

This photo has a high ISO, this has caused the subject to become overexposed

This photo we decided to put a red see through plastic sheet half over the spotlight, leaving half of the light how it was and the other half red, this gave us a really unique image

I really liked this photo and had the idea to try and make it look like the French flag so I went to experiment in light room and gave it a go, here is my outcome:

ISO is a sensitivity set by International Organization for Standardization, it is a number measurement of the cameras sensitivity to light.

A low ISO shows a lower sensitivity and a worse ability to take in light and a high ISO shows a higher sensitivity and a higher ability to take in light.

This photo which took from the internet shows a good example between a low and a high ISO and the in-between range.

Here are some photos me and my group took when trying out multiple ISO’s to see the difference between the range.

The first photo is a super low ISO of 100, photo two and three are a in-between range of moderately low and moderately high and the forth photo is the highest ISO of the four and is around ISO 800.

We took our photos in a already dark place, this being underneath a set of stairs with the only light in the area being the light going through the cracks in-between the stairs.

This photo was taken in the schools assembly hall and was taken with a super high ISO which caused the light to ruin the photos balance and over expose it, “ruining” the image.