MIDTERM SHOWCASE : CONTEMPORARY PORTRAITURE : INDECISIVE MOMENT : FINALS SHOWCASE
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The indecisive moment, in contrast with Henri Cartier-Bresson’s decisive moment, shows that there is no single instant for the photographer to capture. Cartier-Bresson believed that there was a “decisive” moment that the photographer must capture or the image is lost. I am not a supporter of this belief and I sought to push the boundaries of Cartier-Bresson’s work by creating this set of images. My goal for this project was to show that the photographer creates the decisive moment; it doesn’t merely exist. To achieve this I shot a series of motion photographs and used Photoshop to blend them into one singular image. By fusing these images together and showing the subject in multiple places, I want to show that there is no single decisive moment, but rather there are many. Thus, I created a series of indecisive images. |
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In this project, like many others I worked by myself. On top of working alone, for this project I decided to photograph myself. This made the project fun yet challenging. I found this idea of being alone and photographing oneself very interesting, it felt as if I was my only friend. Would if you lived alone and only had yourself to hang out with? Living abroad and alone, this is something I am very familiar to. This project also innately was a dissection of myself. The photographs I chose show very different sides of myself. I enjoy the luxuries when I am home. I am a typical college student when I am at school. And when I am driving in between I want to be able to do it myself yet I need to call for help. |
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For my final project I decided to further my representation from my indecisive movement photos and expand on the idea from Bruce Nauman; “Human/Need/Desire” neon tubing and wire words. Nauman believes that language is a “very powerful tool” and he was inspired to use neon lights because it shows a realistic message. I decided to do a series of photo that represent the word desire by exhibiting what you as a person desire most in life. From that idea I wanted to convey a ‘fairy type’ atmosphere but in a more gloomy setting by playing with the color pallets, outfits and the scenery. In one photo I used a fish eye camera lens to show a dream like feeling, which in many fairy tales life seems like a dream. In some of the photos the subject is looking off into the distance waiting and desiring for someone to be with her at the dinner table to see her beautiful outfit or to see the beautiful scenery. I wanted my viewer to see the subjects desire in a ‘fairy tale’ atmosphere without putting my subjects in a diamond crown or standing with their handsome knights. |
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Jeff Wall’s images are the epitome of what has come to be known as the Indecisive Moment. He calculates every detail, to the extreme of recreating sets for a scene. I decided to essentially appropriate the general idea of his photographs and then add emotion. Wall’s photographs are very calm and collected, while in mine, I wanted to contrast Wall’s photos with a feeling of emotion and/or spontaneity. Throughout the series, each photograph represents a different range of emotions while still paying homage to Jeff Wall by maintaining a similar composition. |
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Using everyday subjects and pieces of industry, Modernists would show the reality of the world, and the beauty that lay within a constructed factory or water tower. Edward Weston was a leader in the modernist movement, and paid great attention to the details of his unique subjects, such as “Artichoke Halved” and “Dunes, Oceano”. Both of these photographs used clarity to emphasize details that the human eye would normally be unable to see. This, mixed with unique framing, lead to subjects that would require the viewer to take more time looking at the picture before they realized the larger picture, or what they were viewing at all. The most famous example of this is his photograph “Pepper #30”, which could be argued as ironically being his most recognizable image today. In my own pictures I wanted to explore how much attention the viewer would pay to details, and what the repercussions of small details would mean for the picture. It’s all in the details. |
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Meet Beatrice “Bibi” and Desmond Carson. They have been my point of interest for the past three months; I babysit them from 3-5 every Monday and Wednesday afternoon. These children have kept me sufficiently entertained, and continue to surprise me with their misplaced sense of adult maturity. Bibi has the beauty and elegance of a Victorian lady, and Desmond casts a devastatingly handsome glare that makes you wonder what he has experienced in his three years of life. |
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This series of portraits was designed to show how expression and mood can be detected by looking at a person’s eyes and hand gestures. The differences in opacity between each image in a set, represents the way we perceive others, either in person or in a photograph. Initially, we look at people’s faces to recognize their thoughts, expression, or mood, so the images of eyes are at 100% opacity to emphasize the impact of facial recognition and perception. The second image in each set is shown at 50% opacity as a way of expressing more subtle information that gestures reveal about character and mood. Each gesture photo in a set is not necessarily meant to be predictable with the depicted gaze, but each pairing captures expressive moments about the subject. In addition to differences in opacity, specific framing was utilized for the eye photographs to limit the scope of facial movement and expression of the subjects. Overall, the cropping targets the direction and type of gazes in the photographs and helps defines the connection between the viewer and subject. |
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As I began my portraiture project earlier in the semester, I stumbled upon the idea of conformity. I feel as though conformity plays a huge roll within friendships and relationship. I personally have experienced this idea and feel as though, I have grown out of it and have become my own individual as many people eventually do. I think that my turning point was studying abroad and feel as though I have changed for the better. As people grow older things change and individuals come into their own. Living on a small campus, people tend to configure themselves and mold themselves into the fads of campus, but after college, things are different. People have their own jobs that mold them, live in different cities that affect them, and gain new relationships that change them. For my project I took pictures of best friends, who were somewhat dressed alike, looked alike or just had some underlying similarity. Through time, relationships change usually due to a friend finding a special interest. Although, when they are friends it is clear they work to emulate one another, whether it is a conscience decision or by coincidence. These five images are capturing the best friends that seem to capture this idea. |
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My goal in this project was to incorporate elements of music into photography. I merge the concepts of time signature and camera time such that the time in the music becomes expressed visually. Time signature is a fraction, the top value equal to the number of beats in a measure, and the bottom value a determinate of which note equals one beat. I bring this to the camera by setting the top value equal to aperture and the bottom value equal to shutter speed. I then select a variety of songs of different time signatures to see what happens. Because it was difficult to shoot the entire keyboard without capturing the tripod legs, I had to shoot myself playing and then rotate the tripod to capture the rest of the image, then piece them together later. And because any artist will tell you that the process is the most important part of art, I included a number of photos to show my process. |
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Where the mind can take you What are postcards? Throughout history, postcards have documented and acted as souvenir cards for travelers. I think that a person can also travel with their mind. For my final project, I wanted to represent that your mind can often take you on a vacation, even if your body doesn’t physically leave. A vacation is defined in the dictionary as “a period of suspension of work, study or other activity, usually used for rest recreation or travel.” As finals are approaching I have constantly been daydreaming and suspending my studies - personally taking my mind on a vacation. For this project I wanted to explore other people’s mind and give them an excuse for them to escape from whatever was stressing them out even if it was only for a moment. I researched and took pictures of a random selection of various ages and asked them where they could be if they could be in anywhere. I photographed them as they pictured themselves behaving in these various locations. I then placed them in the background of their imagination -portraying their ‘vacation’. I found the following conclusions. For example as a whole, I came to the conclusion that children have very vivid imaginations. As people approach middle age, in their 20s – 50s, they became much more realistic. It was interesting to see the different imaginations people picked. Some people were content with the human body or where they were at the moment, while other people explored other options. As a conclusion, this project explores peoples' minds on a short vacation.
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The Automobile Industry is a huge part of the world’s economy. Billions of dollars are spent worldwide each year on cars, car care products, and car aftermarket products and accessories. A lot of this money goes to the advertisement of automobiles. Throughout the industry’s long history, the advertising schemes have evolved and varied widely. Presently, the allure of speed, agility, precision, and sexuality is what sells many cars. Many will go to car shows and peruse automobile magazines to fawn and drool over cars that they will never be able to afford. |
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For my final Project I decided to portray bipolar disorder through photography. I did this by showing the manic and depressed moods in the mind and the relationship they have with each other. I also made some images that do not have the “ghosts” of the mind fighting, but rather show the struggles of a bipolar person on the whole. I tried to make a conscious effort of using my background and vantage point to emphasize what the subjects were doing in the shot. I made the “ghost” shots by taking multiple images of myself and then blending the shots into one image using Photoshop. Some of them express the moods and emotions that can be brought out during one’s manic or depressed states, and others represent the struggle a person faces while trying to pull them self out of such moods. |
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For my final I choose to use the idea of contemporary portraiture and add my own spin on it. In conventional portraits the subjects face is usually seen, gazing right at the lens in clear view. In my contemporary portraits I asked each of my subjects to draw and design their face on a completely blank paper plate. Each subject added their own style to what their face would look like without any direction or advice from anyone else: it was all up to the them what their face would be. I decided that I would shoot six males and six females and after seeing only a few models’ faces I quickly began to realize that there were significant gender differences. Not only can one see the obvious difference in the hands, accessories, and clothing of each model; but one can also recognize that most all of the females choose to draw an idealized image of lips, long eye lashes, noses and even their hair (the brown hair model drawing blonde hair) on their blank plates. On the other hand the males went crazy with faces and most showed off their funnier sides with large bugged eyes, tongues sticking out, and interesting colored hair (to name a few). I believe that these portraits are able to not only show specific characteristics of each model but also show and exemplify true character difference between male and females that exist in our society. |
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A Day in the Life of… |
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Today’s world is a pretty fast moving place. As Matthew Broderick once said, while playing the role of Ferris Buller, “life moves pretty fast, if you don’t stop to look around once in a while you could miss it”. I believe this to be completely true. For my project I choose to have my subjects explore the monotonous everyday objects that surround them. By climbing into things such as compost bins, model bathtubs, and washing machines, we gain a different sense of the world around us. By looking out at the things around us we are able to observe ourselves. Though it may seem obscure to place a human being in these different situations, everyday we do the same thing to inanimate objects. I think we can learn a lot about society by being inanimate ourselves. |
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One of the things that has always fascinated me is what shapes us as people. I have always been someone who has an indistinctive style and a personality that morph easily from situation to situation. However, I have also known people that are the embodiment of a stereotype. This series focuses upon the ability for one person to be many different people. The beginning shot of the blank wall with the chair is a photographic representation of the Lockean idea of the "tabula rasa" in which people are born as blank slates. Not only is this series a reflection of this idea, in which society and those around us shape us as people, but it is also a self portrait of my personality's evolution into what it is today. So much of my personality now is a reflection of all the other personalities I have had. Yet, each of them remain separate within my mind so that they retain their influence upon my actions now. |
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