Unit 3 - Constructed Photography

THIRD RESPONSE


ARTIST RESEARCH:
Inez van Lamsweerde & Vinoodh Matadin

This duo; a fashion design student and an art student from Amsterdam who came together in 1986, are most well known for their work in fashion magazines, advertising campaigns and their independant art work. Their work has been displayed in issues of Vogue all over the globe, and has been used for the most famous brands in the world such as Gucci, Yves Saint Laurent and many many more. Their work is constructed and offers something very visually captivating within the images, for example these images displayed below that were used in a magazine.The theme used in these images is very enhancing, and could illustrate my message very well, and therefore I intend to respond to these series of images.

DEVELOPMENT

EVALUATION

It is evident in my first response that the girl who strives to have the appearance of the blonde girl, is unhappy with her lips.Therefore in this response I focused on the hatred women have toward certain aspects of their appearance and exaggerated it in order to make the message clearer, whilst responding to Lynn Hershman Leeson. I took an element of her work and applied it to my own, for instance the writing and lines drawn on the the image, therefore in my work the female has clearly created a strong vendetta against her own body in that she knows exactly what she wants to change and how she wants to do so, in order to look better. This response really portrays my message, as it is evident this female is obsessed with wanting to look better, and clearly believes appearance is of the upmost importance, and therefore cannot be happy until this changes. In order to show that there is a sombre mood within this photograph I made the image black and white, because then there is no room for happiness (colour) to show through, moreover, the thick black writing upon her body stands out more against the crisp white background and makes the image overall more attractive to the viewer.

SECOND RESPONSE

 RESEARCH TRIP TO THE TATE MODERN AND V&A MUSEUM

On the 19th of October we went to visit some famous galleries and exhibitions in order to gather more inspiration from other artists and photographers, which is exactly what I managed to do. Whilst in the Tate Modern I discovered Lynn Hershman Leeson, who explores a similar theme to the one I intend to work within. From seeing her work, I gathered a new idea to shoot for my next response, along with a similar idea to Clare Strand's as they both explore a similar aspect of my theme of female's being unhappy with their appearance, and their obsession to look better.

(LYNN HERSHMAN LEESON)

(CLARE STRAND)

EVALUATION

In my first response, I developed upon Brittany Dewester's work, whereby I imitated her images however through my running theme of jealous, unhappy females wanting to look better and like other people. Therefore, I had a girl looking in the mirror, however she is not the main focal point, it is the girl next to her who desperately wishes she had her appearance. Moreover, the second image once again explores in more depth into both mine and Dewester's themes because the girl portrays her desperation to look better by eating healthily, while the other female she idolises is able to eat what she likes, because she is visioned to be so perfect. Here is the original image, in order to have the photograph set up the way I wanted, I could be seen in the shot, as could the camera, so I used the clone brush on Photoshop to ersolve the problem. I tried many different ways of going about this, however later discovered that the clone tool was the easiest and most effective of doing so. In my next response I intend to expand on this idea, and look at more detail into the negativity of the female and her desperation to improve herself, to become like other females.

  

FIRST RESPONSE

 ARTIST RESEARCH: Brittany Dewester

Dewester, a budding new photographer who only graduated from her BA course in photography last year, is going to be a key artist throughout my responses. Her work is mainly made up of self-portraiture and conceptual work all of which generally includes lots of colour, creative composition, and strong emotion. She was found on the popular website Flickr and ever since has become a sensation, it was her fairytale pictures that first got me interested in her. Since then I have researched more into her running themese and found other just as captivating photographs, moreover I discovered she tends to explore into the female mind and desires, just as I wish to.

ASSIGNMENT BRIEF

A very popular and relatable issue in the current day is appearance vs reality, particularly with females. Women can become obsessed with constantly wanting to look better, and creating vendettas against their own appearance. All women want to look perfect, and some will not stop at anything to improve themselves. In my work I intend to address this issue with clarity, paying close attention to colour and lighting, whilst responding to artists such as Brittany Dewester and Cindy Sherman. From my work I want to alert all viewers to how serious the matter can become, and how pathetic it is, I want people to be happy with the way they look and realise they will never be happy whilst focusing on trying to look like other people.

INTRODUCTION

Constructed photography is altering a scene or image and falsely creating something either before or after capturing it. Moreover, it is used as a means to emphasize and exaggerate the meaning behind an image as displayed by Jennifer

Research Trip to London

FINAL RESPONSE AND EVALUATION

These images develop upon all of my previous ideas in that, I have succesfully portrayed the relationship between the contemporary and traditional, or more specifically; tourists and architecture. Looking back at the artists who inspired my final piece, you can see how I have responded to their work and developed upon it further, as I have included the theme of  people in the foreground and architecure in the background, however I have managed to do so with the technique of sandwiching in order to make my work more unique and creative. Moreover, the second image is particularly similar to the work of Robert Frank where the point and shoot camera acts as a window, however it is a modernised development of it, which I really like. Although the focus may be taken off the architecture in the second image, the idea that the tourist is so taken with the architecture and clearly views it as something important enough to capture in an image, ensures that it is still a main focal point. I chose to develop on the first image by creating the second image because I wanted to illustrate how the tourists engage with the architecture and one another, as they want to experience the environment and photography is how they record their interaction. The first image merely shows a tourist taking a photograph, however the second image displays what their picture looks like, to depict this message to the audience in more depth.

FURTHER DEVELOPMENT

This is another photograph by Harry Callahan, whereby he has used the technique of sandwiching, I then realised this technique could be ideal for depicting my message with the upmost clarity. To create this image I

dragged two images into photoshop and lay the image of the tourist on top of the other, then altered the opactiy to allow the architecture to show through. Then using these layers, I altered the contrast to make the building stand out more, I did not face any issues when creating this image, and believe the final image looks very effective. It responds to both Robert Frank and Harry Callahan whereby there are two points of interest within one image and they both share the focus.Moreover it also brings in my own concept which is to portray the relationship between contemporary tourists and their interest in traditional architecture, therefore I believe I have been succesful within this task.

I then thought about whether I could explore into my sandwiching idea in even more detail, and came up with an idea similar to the likes of Ken Josephson, however this idea looks into great detail of the tourism side and less into the architecure, so I decided to try and edit further and put a building in the background of the image. I did this again by use layers and the eraser tool, however when looking at the image it takes the focus away from the image shown upon the camera and therefore chose not to use this idea for my final prints. 

SECOND RESPONSE

In my second response, I developed upon my theme of tourism by using actual tourists, which enables me to not only portray my message with more clarity, but also illustrate a further idea which is the interest the contemporary subject, tourists, have in the traditional architecture. This link between the two is very clever as the tourists are unknowingly displaying the importance of the building to the viewer, and I believe I have portrayed all these elements well in my work. Below are the original images before being edited, from my first response I discovered that I wanted to ensure teh buildings had priority of the focus over the contemporary subject, therefore I made the tourists/photographers darker, using the burn tool. This is was very easy to use and resulted in the exact effect I was hoping for.



ARTIST RESEARCH: HARRY CALLAHAN

Harry Callahan's photography is similar to the work of Robert Frank, however it is more suited to my work as he focuses more particularly upon the architecture, and it is in a very similar way as I wish to.Again there are two points of interest, for example in the first image the eye tends to go immediately to the people standing in the foreground, even though the building work is generally the more dominant subject. When looking at the second image I looked at the architecture first, however I couldn't help but then look at the people, and more importantly what type of people they were, for it is this attention to detail that can explain the entire image. You can see they are all smartly dressed adults which alerts the viewer to the whereabouts of this architecture, I really like this element and therefore in my own work I will use people as a means to describe both the whereabouts and importance of the traditional architecture.

FIRST RESPONSE

Considering the research trip was based upon the comparison between traditional and contemporary, I decided to look at how tourists (the contemporary) are infatuated with the traditional architecture of London. Therefore, in my photography you can see how there are elements of tourism in the foreground, and further back are the traditional buildings, for instance St Pauls Cathedral. As a means to respond to Robert Frank I included his theme of the flag, but also having two points of interest within one picture. In this response I explored upon different focuses, for example in the first image the distant traditional architecture is not as crisp and in focus as the flags, which are ultimately the contemporary. Where as in the second photograph it is the building that is in focus. I believe it is more effective to have the building standing out more, and shall go on to continue with that idea in my next response.

CONTACT SHEET

ARTIST RESEARCH: ROBERT FRANK

Robert Frank's photography immediately appealed to me as something I would like to take, and above you can see my immitation of his work (however mine is more based on architecture). There is no exact focus of the picture, because although the eye may instantly head toward the person who is almost "in the way", the object/building in the background is of the same importance and is still incredibly eyecatching. I really like thie idea of having two objects of interest in one picture, one being in the foreground and one further behing, and it is this element I would like to continue in my own work.

INTRODUCTION TO PHOTOSHOP



Here is the edited and un edited image I worked on using Adobe Photoshop CS5, where I used layers, brightness/contrast and the rubber tool. The layers were quite hard to get the hang of, but once I knew how to they were very easy, so I had to duplicate the original layer, and then changed the brightness of it in order to make the red bus and red telephone box stand out as much as possible. After I created another layer and made it black and white, before rubbing out the areas in which the bus and telephone box were, then making teh underneath layer (in colour) show through. It was very simple and the final image looks very effective, the image is a very good way to display London with the iconic images of red buses and red telephone boxes, therefore this edit portrayed it to a very effective standard as the colour stood out even more against the black and white background.