Spring Break Photos

There were two things that I really wanted to do while I was on Spring Break (that were related to this photography course). The first thing I wanted to do was to take pictures of the abandoned power plants and refineries that would have been featured in the documentary film project I proposed, but I unfortunately never got the time to do that. However, I did accomplish my second goal: I got to take pictures of actual people!

It was really liberating for me to take pictures while I was on break. I didn’t really have a theme or purpose in mind while I was photographing my subjects, because we didn’t have class that week so I didn’t feel pressured to relate my photographs to any discussion. That being said, I feel like everyone of the pictures from break that I actually like is connected to one of the topics or photographs brought up in class. Maybe it was just an unconscious influence.

Working with the "models" was not the struggle I was expecting it to be. A lot of people weren’t really interested in being photographed to begin with, but the people who agreed to work with me were willing to do whatever I asked. I really tried to give as little direction as possible, because I knew I wanted to go for something more natural and uncomplicated. I took a good amount of pictures over the break, but a lot of them just didn’t work, and I don’t think it was because of me or the subject - I think there was just something off in the composition. However, I feel like I did get some pretty decent shots.

The pictures this week would probably fit into the deadpan portrait classification discussed by Charlotte Cotton. Until I took this photograph, I never really understood the psychological complication of this genera of photography. Like, I couldn’t really tell why these portraits were a study of the human condition if the photograph was supposed to capture an apathetic expression. After taking this photograph, I understand what the audience is supposed to be looking for in the picture: the face isn’t important, it’s everything but the subject’s face that I should be analyzing. I want to look for the subject’s reaction to the act o being photographed. I want to see what they’re showing, what they’re hiding, and what they’re self-conscious about, all that subtle emotional stuff.

Something Old

I FORGOT TO TURN MY CLOCKS FORWARD!


In the Cotton chapter about documentaries we read for last week’s class, the author discussed a particular photographer who’s documentary projects I really responded to; Zarina Bhimji. I thought the method of photographing “empty” or kind of isolated areas, and then creating a narrative about a particular social theme was a pretty powerful way engage an audience about a particular issue. The more this class peels back the layers of photography as art, the more apparent and rich these narratives become for me. The photos that I took this week were my attempt at creating a narrative though an “empty” or reduced space.

I started with taking photographs in and around my apartment. I think it’s important to start this kind of process by taking pictures of images that are not traditionally viewed as artistic or beautiful. So, the stuff that I photographed were the gross-looking, ignored pieces of my house that most people (myself included) take for granted artistically. The narrative that I was trying to create with this trio of images is concerned with the way things age. Specifically, I wanted to try and confront the way people view or appraise things which are considered “old”, and manipulate that perception by photographing the subjects from a more aesthetically interesting angle.

This exercise ended up with, at least to me, some pretty artistic images (my favorite to date). I feel that I accomplished my goal in reinterpreting age through these subjects, and I don’t think you can tell what these objects are right away just by looking at the pictures. However, the problem with these images lies in the subjective nature of a narrative. With a medium as complicated and personal as photography, it’s super hard to predict how the audience will interpret the images you present. Just because I see a story about age in these photographs doesn’t necessarily mean you will see the same theme. I wonder if professional photographers struggle with this pernicious relationship they have with subjectivity. How does the artist know that their intended message is being received? If their intention is lost, has their perspective and integrity been compromised? Or can they take solace in the fact that a connection (although different then intended) was made with the work?

Photo realism

Probably the biggest problem with trying to work with documentary photography is finding a subject that’s intriguing and powerful enough to warrant multiple photographs. I think documentary photography is challenging because the subject also has to hold he interest of the Photographer and the audience. If you’re at an exhibition of a certain photographer who‘s just showing photographs, and you don’t really respond to one image, you can move onto the next photograph or the next or the next and hopefully find that connection you want with an image. However, with documentary photography, the content within the image is going to be very similar, and while it might change from image to image, you’re looking to tell a cohesive story, if that makes any sense. So, when you’re taking a series of these images, you’re looking for something that builds and evolves from the photo that comes before it. I guess what I’m trying to say is that it was tough to find a subject in less than a week that was accessible for me to try and make a documentary series out. It’s hard to find a subject in which people can find a story.

When I was reading the Cotton article this week, there was a lot of discussion about content and how the image is read, and what kind of narrative unfolds out of a picture. This was the week where the literary aspects of photography made sense while I was reading the text. Usually I have to wait until class, when pictures are discussed in a group, until the analytical part of my brain starts to process the image. I think that’s because when you’re presented with a documentary photograph, you know that something exists outside of the image. That is, when you look at un-documentary (?) image, the significance is the image as a whole, but with a documentary image, the significance lies in the fact that the reality isn’t exclusive to the photo - the person, or whatever is captured in the picture, is actual and not confined the way a traditional photography subject might be. I’m not sure I’m articulating this correctly, but I hope you get my point.
Anyway, the documentary images that I decided to post are of postcards that I was sent from a friend traveling abroad. I think they’re complicated image to analyze because what you’re looking at is a photograph within a photograph. I guess you could argue that an image like that might not be eligible for the “photograph” title. However, I think these images really work well as pictures that isolate. They basically say, “this is where you aren’t”, or “this isn’t the life you’ve have. You chose the mundane, while I chose the glamorous.”