Research Cindy Sherman

Cindy Sherman has been the master of disguise for quite some time, herself portraits often use make-up and props to present an alter-ego of sorts. Her images range from clowns to Stepford wives, apparently Cindy Sherman used dressing up as a form of escapism when she was younger , she went on to catalogue this process and use it to explore the realms of identity.

Most recently Cindy Sherman has taken to Instagram and has been posting ‘selfies’ designed I believe to mimic and ridicule the selfie taking society that now exists.  She proves that we are never truly as we seem and that the images we post are not of our ‘true selves’. So then what is a selfie if it is not a true representation of our self, does the name merely allude to the fact that we take it ourselves.

Cindy Sherman’s Instagram account can be viewed here:

https://www.instagram.com/_cindysherman_/ (Accessed 17.09.17)

Her ‘self portrait’ images are warped beyond what looks realistic, some are doll-like, some are grotesque , they are caricatures.

Claude Cahun

Was Claude the inspiration for Cindy Sherman? Claude took photos of herself in various guises and positions. Her photos seem political and focus on gender. Her name itself can be considered male or female and many of her images leave you wondering on her gender. She was original born and named Lucy but used Claude as her name as well as Daniel. Claude also wrote and during WW2 became an ‘activist’, she was arrested and sentenced to death although this sentence was annulled.

Her work can be seen here:

http://www.connectotel.com/cahun/ (Accessed 20.09.17)

Vivian Maier

I love Maier’s self portraits, they remind me of my shadow images I am starting to collect although I might start looking more at reflections. Her photography did not come to light until late in her life, she worked as a nanny but had amassed a huge portfolio of work including self portraits mostly taken by reflections. Using mirrors, shop windows and shadows she has a range of images in both monochrome and colour.

Her work can be seen here:

http://www.vivianmaier.com/gallery/self-portraits/ (Accessed 20.09.17)

Hobbes Ginsburg

It is difficult to find much about Hobbes Ginsburg other than her photographs, but she has an interesting series of ‘selfies’ or self portraits which explore gender, as well as anxiety and depression. In an article with I.D with Dean Kissick in 2015 she say:

I think it’s an outlet for taking a lot of the negativity that I feel at times and making something more positive and more pretty out of it. When you’re feeling really depressed, not doing anything – empty – you can take that feeling and make this thing out of it, using yourself as an important icon in the photo, and making something that’s very pleasing to the eye, and it becomes a moment to release that energy into something better.

So I think there’s probably a lot of internalized misogyny when it comes to thinking about things in that way. And I think it’s a lot of misplaced negativity in terms of what taking selfies is because everyone else has always been that, sort of, self-centred and narcissistic; people have painted self-portraits, and that took hours and hours and hours. People have always been recreating their own image, it’s just that now it’s become more readily accessible and it’s not only elite white dudes who can create images of themselves

Her work can be seen here:

http://hhobbess.tumblr.com/ (Accessed 20.09.17)

Iiu Susiraja

 

Iiu is a photographer from Finland whose collection of self portraits appears to say that abnormal is normal! There is a humour to her photographs and a brutal honesty. In an article for Dazed she says:

What do you want people to feel when they see your work?

iiu Susiraja: To feel freedom to perform how they want to in their own self-portrait. And the best part is if the viewer has conflicting thoughts with my art.

Boredpanda.com writes “Some of us use selfies as a vain form of self-expression, trying to make ourselves look richer, happier or more beautiful than we really are. Iiu Susiraja, however, turns this concept of the selfie on its head by taking brutally honest, surreal and unflinchingly funny self-portraits using her own body and other objects as props.

There is a warm humour to the images, in one she holds a broomstick under her breasts, this image made me recall the pencil test. In secondary school I remember reading an article in a teen magazine that suggested the way to know if you had pert breasts was to put a pencil underneath. If the pencil dropped out your breasts were pert if it stayed then they were supposedly saggy! I failed the pencil test but I think with age and wisdom it was because they were larger, they are still not was I would consider saggy. How impressionable magazines can be to a young girl!

Her work can be seen here:

http://www.iiususiraja.com/portfolio/valokuvat/ (Accessed 20.09.17)

Jo Spence

Jo Spence’s work fascinates me, the later part of her career was spent photographing her breast cancer and treatment which has resulted in very emotive self portraits. They are open and honest, showing her scars and vulnerability. She apparently looked to Chinese medicine rather than the usual radiotherapy and chemotherapy but did in fact beat the cancer. Sadly she died of Leukaemia in 1992 after overcoming her cancer.  But I am also interested in her work entitled ‘ Beyond the family album’ which seems to explore how though the family album she was perceived and how it informed her as a person. I would like to look at this work in more detail.

Her work can be seen here:

http://www.jospence.org/ (Accessed 20.09.17)

 

It may be coincidence but I have noticed that all of the above although sometimes exploring gender are woman, even Francesca Woodman is known for her self portraiture but I cannot think of a male photographer? Are woman  more open, exploratory or narcissistic?

 

 

 

Assignment 1 – Gender

Seeing comes before words. The child looks and recognizes before it can speak. (John Berger)

We are not born with gender and it is not something we have or acquire , it is what we do and what we surrounds us that adds the dimension of gender. Sex is the biological classification for our reproductive ‘type’ , gender is implied by society.

Biological factors are not responsible for girls wearing dresses or boys playing with toy cars, this is learned behaviour from the society that they grow up in.

From the moment a mother announces she is pregnant it becomes a ‘he’ or a ‘she’, different names are considered for a boy or a girl. Birth announcements and new-born clothes are pink or blue. This sentence even demonstrates how naturally it exists in our everyday language: It is always ‘boy or girl’ not ‘girl or boy’, ‘he or she’ instead of ‘she or he’ , ‘Mr & Mrs never Mrs & Mr’, ‘Sons & daughters but not daughters & sons’, ‘Husband & Wife instead of ‘Wife & Husband’. The male is put in a position of leadership before they are even born and gender is engrained in everyday life so that by the time they are toddlers they already understand the definition of ‘Male’ and ‘Female’ and the differences that society has imposed. Children are not merely called good, they are good boys or good girls, bathrooms are no longer unisex outside of the home, yet strangely disabled toilets still exist as unisex? Cars for boys, dolls for girls, rough and tough playtime with the boys, playing dress up with the girls.

Even advertising acts in a subversive way to inform on gender, In Erving Goffman’s book ‘Gender Advertisements’ he explains how woman are pictured using their fingers and hands to caress or trace the outlines of an object whereas a man is predominantly shown grasping an object. This shows the woman as delicate, fragile and soft and the man as hard, practical and strong. Men are shown taller next to the female to signify them as protectors, naturally most couples when finding a mate end up with the safe ratio of the taller male and the shorter female, the opposite mix is often viewed uncomfortably.

Oddly it seems that society accepts woman in the male role but not the other way round! It is ok for a woman to wear trousers, be a ‘tomboy’ and even have a male name such as Chris or Toni. Men seem to luck out as society does not accept men wearing dresses (Kilts aside), being more feminine or being called Sarah.

Why does this double standard exist? Why is it ok for a woman to wear Levis (Originally designed for men) but not for a man to wear a dress. Why is it acceptable for woman to apply make-up but not men?

Gender neutral clothing ranges are really just insipid coloured men’s clothing designed to fit everyone, a recent so-called gender neutral school unveiled uniform which consisted of trousers?

I put a request on Facebook for couples willing to have some photos taken, unfortunately most people were not comfortable with their images being taken and used for an assignment. The few I have were interesting and I wonder if the people depicted would be viewed differently merely based on a change of clothes:

The ‘Boys’:

 

The ‘Girls’:

 

 

Social media

Someone shared an interesting YouTube video with me which had some interesting facts. As I am currently looking at profile pictures as one of my ideas I thought it was quite apt:

 

 

Developing ideas

I have been busy thinking of a variety of ideas and have been trying to work out how I could accomplish them.

Gender :

Exploring gender and perceptions is a tricky one as I do not know anyone in my circle of friends that are gender fluid or could be represented as such which was where my initial thoughts were going. As my thought have progressed I have looked more towards our perception of gender and this threw up a few ideas for me to explore:

Idea 1:

Subversive gender (If that is such a term) : We are surrounded without even often noticing it by gender signs. ‘Boys toys’ and ‘Girls toys’, different bathrooms although it is strangely ok for disabled people to be unisex? Pinks and blues, even greeting cards are obviously either masculine or feminine, I have never seen a picture of a pint on a card for a sister for example and equally there are no butterflies for a brother.

With this in mind I could present two sets of images, one of masculine images and / or stereotypes that surround us in the everyday and one of feminine. This would be the easiest option for this assignment!

Idea 2:

Gender Perception : When you google portrait photography tips I noticed that there is some tradition surrounding the family image which seems to put the male in the position of protector and the female as submissive, even in photographs of couples this also seems to be true. I then came across the work of Linda Ya Wing Li and I found it interesting that by simply changing clothing the dynamics of the image can sometimes change. The portraits in which the couple seem to wear gender neutral clothes do not alter too much in perception as the ones whose clothes are more ‘masculine’ or ‘feminine’ yet they are merely clothes! What do we see them so differently? Why does it become uncomfortable?

https://www.lindali-photography.com/personal-projects-c897

I thought this might be difficult as it would mean finding couples willing to swap clothes, not an easy task although I decided to try my luck and post a request on Facebook. I didn’t get many takers but I was surprised by the few that almost seems too keen to oblige (my husband included…should I be worried?)

Idea 3:

Around the same idea as above I thought of taking full body shots and headshots as well which I could make into a face or body flip book. I will need to make this as an item as I do not yet have the skills to create similar images in Photoshop. I could then re-photograph the ‘mixed up’ images.

I could even attempt to include make up on men and contouring on woman to look masculine to add to the ‘mixed’ images?

Idea 4:

This is not around gender but about how we portray ourselves to the outside world and how we all have ‘another side’. It always astounds my how different people often look on social media, mostly the younger generation. My daughter will show me pictures of her friends and I barely recognise them, they look far older and more ‘sexy’ than the reality which is worrying. Is it miss-representation? Is it peer pressure? Why is there a need to conform? What is beauty anyway? Oddly this got me thinking about myself, I prefer to be behind the camera as I hate having my picture taken, If I do post a photo to social media I add filters or edit it slightly so it looks ‘acceptable’, why do I presume people will judge me differently? Why should I care? How did I not see that I am partly to blame for this generation taking it one step further? Even in day-to-day life we all present ourselves to the outside world. Some people may not care and have a ‘take it leave it’ attitude, some might be hiding scars (Physically or mentally), some might want to appear happy and ‘together’ when their life might not be. I never leave the house without make-up, not even to put the rubbish out, if I have a day at home with not a soul in sight I would still apply my make-up. It has become part of me, I do not like seeing the person I am without it. This may appear vain but believe me I am not in any way a vain person I am merely seeking acceptance in a world that feels increasingly shallow. A google search on ‘Selfies’ throws up sites that instruct you on how to be photogenic, how to pout, how to pose, it is becoming an art form in its self yet it adds pressure to young people to conform.

So the idea here would be to take an honest straight to camera ‘selfie’ then for the ‘two sides of the story’ I would give the person my iPhone. The instruction would be to take a selfie with the phone in which ever manner they would usually and I would let them have access to a variety of apps in which to edit, airbrush or add filters until they are happy with what they see. I will then present to two images side by side.

Presuming that my willing couples turn up on Wednesday evening I could use them to accomplish ideas  2,3 and 4 which will give me a chance to explore them all. I wont get another opportunity to get couples together so it will be a get it right first time event, no pressure! After this I will have to hope the ideas work otherwise I will need to go to option 1.

 

Ideas

Create at least two sets of photographs telling different versions of the same story. The aim of the assignment is to help you explore the convincing nature of documentary, even though what the viewer thinks they see may not in fact be true. Try to make both sets equally convincing so that it’s impossible to tell which version of the images is ‘true’.
It might be interesting to consider the project as evidence for a court case. What conflicting stories can you make your images convincingly tell? Would it stand up in court?

Re-reading the brief I am not sure that my initial ideas actually meet the criteria above? My ideas are centred around two versions of the truth (Hidden and public) but this seems to suggest one set should be ‘untrue’? Also I am unsure how I could tie in two sides to the gender debate? I think much more planning and experimenting is needed. I am aware that my second extended deadline is fast approaching and I still have coursework exercises to get through. I feel quite strongly about some of my idea so I would like to do them justice, otherwise I may need to rethink to a simpler idea and re-visit these for a re-work opportunity with more time to develop them.

I am currently reading through John Berger’s ‘Ways of seeing’ and ‘Gender Trouble’ by Judith Butler in the hope I can get some inspiration.

Assignment one – Initial ideas

I had a few initial thought when I glanced ahead at the assignment and I mentioned these to my tutor at our introduction. The ideas have continued to swirl around however the summer holidays have got in the way and it has taken much longer to get through the exercises, I am still not finished on those yet!

Two sides to a story made my think of how there are two sides , sometimes multiple sides to a person. I was also thinking along the lines of how our ‘public’ image is often very different from our personal / private image.

• I often come across social media images of people who so different in person, it is commonplace now for people to apply filters, edit images and take a multitude of images before selecting ‘the one’. There is a pressure for perfection.
• What processes do we all go though to present ourselves to the world. I wouldn’t dream of leaving the house without make-up, it has become a part of me which leaves me naked and vulnerable without it, what ‘armour’ do people apply to present a ‘front’ and what are they hiding. I was also thinking of people who cover their scars and the story behind them.
• Two ways of seeing things – The life and soul of the party or someone on the edge and susceptible to drugs or alcohol? The quiet wallflower or the person uncomfortable in their own skin? The jones’ everyone aspires to be or a family hiding its problems with material things?
• Gender… Could I somehow explore the two sides of the gender debate. There is currently a growing argument to remove gender, could I explore both male and female gender or gender neutrality? Can I pose boys as girls and girls as boys? would I find willing models?

Apart from some obvious research and reading I think I will start by putting a request for potential models or willing participants on Facebook. Without willing models may of my ideas will not be able to go much further.

I also had another idea along the lines of gender in which I thought I could make a type of children’s book of photographs. The ones where you can mix the head, eyes, nose etc. to make a different face. I could use models then mix up the final outcomes and re-shoot the mixed up images, or perhaps find a way to accomplish this in light room or Photoshop (No skills in this department yet). I might find I get more willing models this way!

 

Assignment one – Brief

Two sides of the story

This assignment is designed to give your tutor a feel for your work and won’t count towards your final grade if you decide to have your work assessed. However, the assessors may wish to see it so that they can gauge your progress across the course.
Create at least two sets of photographs telling different versions of the same story. The aim of the assignment is to help you explore the convincing nature of documentary, even though what the viewer thinks they see may not in fact be true. Try to make both sets equally convincing so that it’s impossible to tell which version of the images is ‘true’.

It might be interesting to consider the project as evidence for a court case. What conflicting stories can you make your images convincingly tell? Would it stand up in court?

Choose a theme and aim for 5–7 images for each set, depending on your idea. Discuss this with your tutor.

Here are a few ideas: • You could interpret this brief by showing the same scenario from two different angles. Does this alter how we read the situation?

• You may wish to create an alter ego by using snapshots of yourself or a friend. This could involve photographing them in two very different and potentially conflicting personas.

• You could make a parody of a dating website profile picture. Create different versions of the same person looking completely different in each one.

Which one represents them best and how can we know?
Or you may prefer to use your own take on the theme.

However you choose to interpret the brief, ensure the images are candid and ‘taken from real life’.

Be experimental and take some risks. Perhaps you could make a list of ideas and choose the most challenging or absurd option to stretch yourself