Assignment Three – self-portrait

Assignment Three asks us to keep a diary for a couple of weeks and then to interpret parts of it into a photographic self-portrait.  We are also requested to include an introduction with our submission of around three hundred words.

Self-portraiture can take many forms and I decided to explore self-absented portraiture as a way of representing myself.  In particular I looked to see how I could achieve my self-portrait in a metaphorical rather than in a descriptive way and I saw the assignment as an opportunity to try something different, to experiment and to take a risk with my approach.

Introduction:

My aims for this assignment were to keep myself out of the frame, to experiment and to take risks.  I therefore looked to see how I could present my self-portrait in a metaphorical rather than a descriptive way.

An undercurrent in my life over the past months has been uncertainty surrounding my personal circumstances at work.  However throughout January positive developments unfolded which mean that that my circumstances are a little more stable and I decided to use this period of uncertainty, transition and moving forward as the basis for the assignment.

My main influence was Luisa Lambri and her use of buildings, space and light to create self-portraits of absence. Inspired by her Untitled (Darwin D. Martin House) series, I decided to portray my work situation through a series of images using architecture, light and shadow to metaphorically represent myself.  From the shadow of uncertainty, bands of light would represent the positivity and direction that developed as a solution to my circumstances became apparent.

I constructed a series of sequential images that show the passing of time and also my movements, both physically and emotionally, towards a more defined future.  Influenced by Lambri I processed the images quite heavily and Berenice Abbott informed my decision to use vertical letter-box framing. Monochrome processing left the images looking flat and subdued so I elected to present them in colour.

Due to the confidential nature of my theme it was not appropriate to include the relevant excerpts from my diary in the assignment.  I decided that text accompanying each image would be superfluous as the series stood adequately on its own and I also wanted viewers to be able to project their own selves and experiences on to the photographs (Bate, 2009). However I felt that an introduction to the series was necessary to provide some context.

Theme:

Coming out of the railway station in London every morning I need to walk around a tall wigwam-like steel sculpture in order to carry on to my place of work.  It forms a forbidding barrier to my entry to the City yet rays of light offer a pathway through its core.  Stone steps at the far side offer an escape from the structure, an escape from my current personal circumstances at work yet lead upwards into the unknown.  Moving my position and gaze in order to photograph widening bands of light reflect both the passing of time and my movements, both physically and emotionally, towards a more defined future.

Processing and style:

Again influenced by Lambri, I applied quite heavy post-processing (for me) to the images, reducing exposure, deepening the blacks and shadows and enhancing whites and highlights in order to convey what I wanted to say.  I also tried converting the images to monochrome but I felt that this left them flat and subdued so I decided to remain with the colour versions.

I used vertical letter-box framing for the series.  This decision was inspired by seeing Berenice Abbott’s image View of Exchange Place from Broadway, New York, 1934 at the Constructing Worlds: Photography and Architecture in the Modern Age exhibition in London.  As well as suiting the style of the composition, the framing implies the verticality of the City of London where new buildings are growing upwards in order for the Square Mile to expand and also, more metaphorically, the positive change to my personal circumstances.

All images were shot in RAW and processed in Lightroom 5 and Photoshop.

Research:

Having decided that I wanted to focus on self-absented portraiture I divided my research for the assignment into two areas:

• photographers who keep their physical selves out of their self-portraits
• Style and presentation

The outcome of my research can be viewed by clicking on the links above.

 The images:

Self

Self  is my response to a set of personal circumstances at work, representing a period of uncertainty and instability whilst also embracing transition and positivity.

A series of self-absented portraits, Self uses architecture, light and shadow to explore my presence and experiences within an emotional space.  Beginning in a place of darkness and uncertainty, small changes in my position and gaze reflect the passage of time as well as my movement, both physically and mentally, towards a clearer future.

Conclusion:

I really enjoyed this assignment.  After initially dreading the idea of creating a self-portrait it was a relief to discover that I could keep myself physically out of the frame and I realised that the assignment gave me an incredible amount of scope as to what I could do.  With this in mind I was adamant that I would work on my weaker areas and try to experiment, explore and take risks (the latter being particularly difficult for me), a process that I had started in the previous assignment and one that I was keen to build on.

I have taken a metaphorical approach to the assignment, using architecture, light and shadow as a means to express myself through a series of self-absented portraits.  I analysed what I thought the brief was asking for (the presentation of myself, either directly or indirectly, as subject matter) and consider that my assignment submission meets this criteria.   My justification for choosing to take such a non-literal approach is that I felt that it was important to challenge myself and to push myself far out of my comfort zone, to take risks and to continue my progression with making work that is expressive rather than being purely descriptive.   I have underpinned my judgement in choosing this approach through my research where I found a major influence in Luisa Lambri. Lambri informed me that I could use space, architecture, shadow and light to create a self-portrait of absence.  Rather than purely replicate Lambri’s work I took inspiration from her vision, developing my own ideas and trying to communicate my own experiences and emotions.  The end result is that I feel that I have created a series of images that capture something inside of me.

References:

Abbott, B. (1934) View of Exchange Place from Broadway, New York, 1934 [online image].  Christie’s. Available from http://www.christies.com/lotfinder/photographs/berenice-abbott-view-of-exchange-place-from-5420855-details.aspx  [accessed 26 January 2015]

Bate, D. (2009) Photography: the key concepts.  New York: Berg

Lambri, L. (2007) Darwin D. Martin House [online images].  Marc Foxx Gallery. Available from http://www.marcfoxx.com/artists/2899/works/37325/1 [accessed 15 January 2015]

Assignment Three – planning and preparation

Following on from my first thoughts on this assignment (see here) I revisited my ideas and found that one in particular kept coming into my mind as a project that I felt I would enjoy, that would fit the brief yet would also challenge me both photographically and creatively.  With this idea in mind, I then carried out some preliminary research for the assignment as a whole which I divided into two strands:

• To look at photographers who keep their physical selves out of their self-portraits
• The presentation and style of my assignment

The outcome of my research can be viewed by clicking on the links above.

One underlying theme of the past year for me has been uncertainty surrounding my personal circumstances at work.  I cannot include more details or my diary extracts here due to confidentiality issues but suffice to say that over the past few weeks certain positive developments have led to a clearer perspective.

From my research I found that I was particularly inspired by the work of Luisa Lambri, in particular her use of buildings and light to represent herself within a place.  Strongly influenced by Lambri’s Untitled (Darwin D. Martin House) series of images that I first saw at the recent Constructing Worlds: Photography and Architecture in the Modern Age exhibition in London, I had the idea of portraying my personal circumstances at work and the subsequent developments in a set of photographs using architecture, light and shadow to metaphorically represent myself.  From within the shadow of uncertainty, bands of light would represent the positive emotions that developed within me as things started to become clearer.

Having decided upon my theme the next step was to consider the practicalities.  The issues that I could see were:

• Finding a suitable location for the shoot
• The need for either bright natural light or sunlight (not always around in February)
• The manner in which to submit my assignment – given that it involves my personal circumstances at work I may have to hand in a physical submission to my tutor/assessors rather than share my thoughts online.

Finding a location proved surprisingly easy.  Coming out of the railway station in London every morning I need to walk around a tall metal sculpture in order to carry on to my place of work.  The sculpture is comprised of five upright steel sheets leaning against each other to create a wigwam effect.  Rays of light shine through the gaps between three of the sheets, the rays varying in width according to the viewer’s position.  The sculpture I felt was perfect to reflect my self-portrait in a metaphorical manner – it is a dark, forbidding barrier to my entry to the City, yet the rays of light offer a pathway through its core.  Stone steps to the rear offer an escape from the architecture, an escape from my personal uncertainty yet lead into the unknown (what will the future bring?).  Moving my position and gaze in order to photograph widening bands of light reflect both the passing of time and also my movements, both physically and emotionally, within a space.

I needed fairly bright light to shine through the gap in the sculpture but this was always going to be dependent upon the weather conditions.  My offices are only a ten-minute walk away so it is fairly easy for me to run out with my camera once/if the sun appears. This short distance was another factor when deciding upon a suitable location for the shoot.

After looking at different image formats, I decided to use vertical letter-box framing for the series.  This was inspired by Berenice Abbott’s work at the Constructing Worlds: Photography and Architecture in the Modern Age exhibition.  Immediately I saw her image View of Exchange Place from Broadway, New York, 1934 I knew that I wanted to use this style of framing somewhere in my work in the future and when planning the assignment I felt that it would suit the vertical composition of my assignment images.  The framing style implies both the verticality of the City of London where new buildings are growing upwards in order for the Square Mile to expand and also, more metaphorically, my emotions as my personal circumstances at work became a little clearer.

My next step was to consider the best treatment for the images. I needed to show light contrasting against dark so, influenced again by Lambri, I applied quite heavy (for me) post-processing, reducing exposure, deepening the blacks and shadows and enhancing whites and highlights which I felt worked well and conveyed what I wanted to say.  I also tried converting the images to monochrome but felt that this left them flat and subdued so I remained with the colour versions.

I then thought about presentation.  Out of necessity I had to shoot hand-held and realised from my test shots that I would need to use an ISO of at least 500 in order to have sufficient shutter speed.  As the procedure for obtaining photography shoot permissions which would allow me to use a tripod (and therefore a low ISO) are rather complex and would involve OCA involvement I decided not to go that route for the purposes of this assignment.  I will try a test print from one of my final images and check for ‘noise’ before deciding whether to present the series as prints for final assessment or purely online on my blog.

My next decision was to choose in what form to submit the assignment to my tutor.  I discarded the idea of sending a physical diary containing my written entries as I did not think that this would suit the style of the images and it was not what I wanted from my work.  I was also aware of confidentiality issues.  After some thought I decided that text to accompany each image would be superfluous – I think that the series viewed as a body of work stands on its own – but that a written foreword/introduction for the series would be necessary as context for my tutor and assessors who will be looking to see how I’ve treated the brief rather than carrying out any introspection themselves.

I also considered who will be my wider audience for the finished project.   Ultimately I would like to see this series hanging on a gallery wall.  Whilst I would preface the set with an introductory artist statement I would not use further text to accompany each photograph as I like the idea of viewers forming their own understanding of what they see, allowing them to project their own selves and experiences onto the images as discussed by Bate (2009).  Therefore in my further plans for this piece of work I have moved on and away from the original idea of a diary, although the concept of absented self-portraiture remains.

References:

Abbott, B. (1934) View of Exchange Place from Broadway, New York, 1934 [online image].  Christie’s. Available from http://www.christies.com/lotfinder/photographs/berenice-abbott-view-of-exchange-place-from-5420855-details.aspx  [accessed 26 January 2015]

Bate, D. (2009) Photography: the key concepts.  New York: Berg

Lambri, L . (2007) Darwin D. Martin House [online images]   Marc Foxx Gallery.  Available from http://www.marcfoxx.com/artists/2899/works/37325/1  [accessed 15 January 2015]

Pardo, A. and Redstone, E. (ed.) (2014) Constructing Worlds: Photography and Architecture in the Modern Age.   London: Prestel Publishing Limited

Exercise: Nigel Shafran – ‘Washing Up’ (2000)

We are asked to look at Nigel Shafran’s series of images entitled Washing Up (2000) and then to respond to some questions.Washing Up is a series of images taken by Shafran in 2000 of completed washing up, usually in his own kitchen but sometimes elsewhere.  The photographs are accompanied by text detailing what he ate and sometimes other interesting snippets of information, for example who else was present at the meal.The first thing that struck me about Washing Up is how organised and structured Shafran’s images are.  The kitchen items are stacked neatly into sculptural forms with no untidy clutter lying about, which gives us an insight into the dish-washer’s personality (we are not told whether it is Shafran or his partner Ruth who has done the washing up).  This neatness and use of form reminds me of Thomas Demand’s image Sink (Spüle) (1997); although different in composition and construction (Demand’s ‘sink’ was a paper model) I immediately felt a similarity with Shafran’s images.

I wondered why Shafran chose washing up as a subject and I found the answer in an interview he gave to Paul Elliman in 2000:

‘I wanted to start the New Year with something  optimistic.  And personal.  Something with lots of shapes, where shapes would change, keep changing.  Also something in which the light was important, the kitchen window or the overhead kitchen light, I mean.  I really wanted to have one that was lit by lightning, haven’t got that yet. There are signs of ageing in it, like signs of time, of course’.

(Elliman, 2000)

What I like about this series is its simple style and how Shafran makes ordinary, everyday items into an interesting composition which gives rise to many questions.   For once I agree with Charlotte Cotton who writes:

‘With an understated photographic style, use of ambient light and relatively long exposures, he transforms these scenes into poetic observations about the ways we conduct our lives through our unconscious acts of ordering, stacking and displaying objects. There is something highly intuitive in Shafran’s way of working.  He resists the urge to construct a scene to be photographed ; rather, his is a process of staying attuned to the possibilities of everyday subjects as a means of exploring our characters and ways of life’

(Cotton, 2014, p.121)

Question: did it surprise you that this was taken by a man?  Why?

No, not at all.  In fact the question did not even cross my mind.  I think this is due to my recent research into photographers such as Thomas Demand and Jeff Wall where I’ve learned that such stereotypes do not seem to exist now in contemporary photography.

Question: in your opinion does gender contribute to the creation of an image?

In general I think the creation of an image is more due to the interests and personality of the photographer than their gender.  However I do believe that men and women have different ways of looking at things and this can come across in their interpretation of a subject or theme.

Question: what does this series achieve by not including people?

It makes me very happy!  Seriously, I think that the lack of people gives far more depth to the image than if they were present.  We know that a person was there (the washing up is done) so Shafran’s images convey a presence of absence, adding a sense of the passing of time. The viewer is encouraged to explore and to trace the human activity from the evidence left behind – who was there?  What did they look like?  I also think that the inclusion of people would also change the tone of the series completely from still life (fine art even?) towards social documentary.

Question: do you regard them as interesting ‘still life’ compositions?

On an aesthetic level I find the shapes, lighting and splashes of colour give interest to what could be seen initially as quite banal images.  Shafran has made the ordinary into something artistic and I really like his use of natural light.  Looking deeper, I like the way the images provide a visual punctuation mark, a comma, in the daily routine – cooking, eating, washing up, the putting away of dry dishes so we are invited to think about what has happened before and what will happen after.  We are told a little – the composition of the meal that had just been eaten and sometimes who was present – which whets our appetite to know more.

My main take-away from Shafran’s work in relation to my own practice is that everyday subjects, ones that might be considered banal even, have their worth photographically on a number of levels.  I find it is very easy to overlook, maybe dismiss even, what is immediately around me in search of the ‘great and the good’ so Shafran’s images are a timely reminder of what I have been missing and of a need to really look, rather than just see.

References:

Cotton, C. (2014) The Photograph as Contemporary Art.  3^rd ed.  London: Thames & Hudson

Demand, T. (1997) Spüle. [photograph] [online image]. Bundesverband deutscher Kunstversteigerer e.V.   Available from http://service.kunstversteigerer.de/de/i/5201304/p/1/ [accessed 16 January 2015]

Elliman P. (2000)   Interview with Paul Elliman, Fig-1. [online].  Nigel Shafran.  Available from http://www.nigelshafran.com/pages/texts_pages/002texts.html  [accessed 16 January 2015]

Shafran, N. (2000) Washing Up [online images].  Nigel Shafran.  Available from http://www.nigelshafran.com/pages/washing_up_pages/001washing_up_pages.html [accessed 16 January 2015]

Self-absented portraiture – Maria Kapajeva and Sophie Calle

The third project of this part of the course looks at self-absented portraiture.  The course notes begin by discussing two photographers who, rather than photographing themselves, use other methods of telling the viewer something of who they are.  Here is a brief summary of each.Maria Kapajeva – A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Woman

Kapajeva uses people in a metaphorical sense to depict herself in photographs.  In A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Woman, an ongoing project, she has photographed young women with whom she identifies and sees as her peers in a contemporary society, therefore putting a picture of ‘herself’ forward to the viewer without actually being personally in the frame.  She writes about the aim for the project on her website  –  ‘With this ongoing project I am interested to open debates on imagery of women in contemporary society in the context of the historical, cultural bias and the global changes we are each going through’ (Kapajeva).  In effect she is presenting through others how she feels it is like to be a woman in today’s world and she discusses this in further depth, along with other aspects of her career, in an interview with Sharon Boothroyd (Boothroyd, 2014) which can be read here

Sophie Calle – Take Care of Yourself

Take Care of Yourself is a response by Calle to an email she received from her then-boyfriend breaking off their relationship.  Tellingly, the email is signed off ‘Take care of yourself’, which is exactly what Calle did, firstly as a catharsis to her pain then later as an art project.  She sent a copy of the email to 107 women, all professionals in their respective fields, took pictures of them reading it and asked them to analyse the text according to their job.  The contributions provided by the women were in a wide range of media and included scientific analysis, a crossword puzzle, origami, forensic analysis, song and dance and a shooting target (Neri, 2009).   The resulting artwork formed from the responses Calle received was then exhibited at the Venice Biennale in 2007 (Chrisafis, 2007) and comprised photographs, text, graphics and video (Coulter-Smith, 2007).

Calle has used other people (the writers of the emails) to stand in for herself.  I see this piece of work as autobiographical – it’s about Calle and her reaction to the break-up of her relationship – however by deliberately passing the responsibility for her project on to others she allowed it to develop outside of her direction and away from herself, addressing wider issues such as feminism, control and power.  I’ve written in more depth about this piece of work earlier in my Context and Narrative studies (see my post here).

These pieces of work by Kapajeva and Calle are very different in their approach to self-absented portraiture.  Kapajeva’s images use other women as the way to explore and express  her ‘self’ and are calm and measured, giving the feeling of a collaborative journey whilst Calle’s work is much more immediate and confrontational, aggressive even.  Yet it is to Calle’s work that I am drawn the most; its liveliness and sassiness attract and intrigue me and I like the feistiness of her approach to formulate a response to her situation.  I also have the forthcoming assignment in my mind and have decided at this stage not to include images of people so I take more inspiration from Take Care of Yourself in this regard.

References:

Boothroyd, S. (2014)  Maria Kapajeva [online].  Photoparley.  Available from https://photoparley.wordpress.com/2014/05/13/maria-kapajeva/  [accessed 16 January 2015]

Calle, S. (2007) Take Care of Yourself [online images].  Paula Cooper Gallery.  Available from http://www.paulacoopergallery.com/exhibitions/56  [accessed 19 January 2015]

Chrisafis, A (2007) He loves me not [online].  The Guardian.  Available from http://www.theguardian.com/world/2007/jun/16/artnews.art [first accessed 09 September 2014]

Coulter-Smith, G. (2007)  Sophie Calle, Take Care of Yourself, 2007 Venice Biennale [online]. Artintelligence.  Available from http://artintelligence.net/review/?p=147 [first accessed 10 October 2014]    This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Licence.

Kapajeva, M. (2012 – )  A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Woman [online text and images].  Maria Kapajeva.  Available from http://www.mariakapajeva.com/a-portrait-of-the-artist-as-a-young-woman/  [accessed 16 January 2015]

Neri, L. (2009) Sophie Calle [online].  Interview Magazine.  Available from http://www.interviewmagazine.com/art/sophie-calle/ [first accessed 10 October 2014]