365 days

Last October, Portland based 17 year old photographer Brendon Burton began an ambitious project in which he committed to creating one self-portrait every day for a year. Now, half a year later, Burton is still going strong and his Flickr photo-stream is full of beautiful and creative images that show his development as a photographer. 

When a lot of people think of self portraits, they think of a simple image showing their own face, not doing anything particularly exciting. For a 17 year old to come up with such creative images, and to display them online is really inspiring. From looking at this site, I have decided to produce my own self portrait project starting at the beginning of next year. I do not want my series of work to be boring or tedious to the viewers. I want it to portray me as a person, through the environment that I am photographed in, the clothes I am wearing and my expression from day to day; just as Burton has done here. 

But its just a phone!

I have recently been interested in looking at different styles of camera and photography. From some research, I came across a competition for the best mobile phone photograph. I was not expecting much because, personally, the camera on my phone is not the best. However, the entries for each category were well presented and well composed. My favourite would have to be the winner for the 'infrastructure' category: 

Although there were a limited number of categories, the images selected to win are really creative seeing as they were only using a mobile phone. Even though some of the images are fairly simple, I like the way that they have managed to use depth of field and shutter speed on their phones, making them look professional and interesting. 

A lot of people have recently argued that Apps such as 'Instagram' are ruining photography because there is nothing to it - you just take a photo with a click of a button, and then choose between a few filters to make the image look worthy. However, I disagree with this view, because I feel that mobile photography is a different kind of photography. People always carry their phone with them, whereas a lot of people do not carry a camera. This means that lots more people (not always photographers) have the chance to capture a moment in time, rather than think 'oh I don't have my camera with me...'

Fake

I recently read an article about an anorexic girl who strongly believes that airbrushing should be banned when photographers are editing images for the public eye. The 21 year old from Warrington suffered from anorexia throughout her teenage years and had been given 48 hours to live. She says her eating disorder was made worse by photoshopped pictures of celebrities in magazines. This made me think, why do so many girls aspire to look like magazine models? What is so good about being skinny and glamourous? Also, why is it so acceptable that so many young girls are making themselves thinner just to look like these women?

"The Home Office review Sexualisation of young people has recommended that airbrushed images used within the media should be indicated with a symbol, and that age restrictions should be introduced on 'lads' magazines'.

Unite/CPHVA Health Visitor Forum chair Maggie Fisher stated: 'These recommendations are a good way forward. Airbrushed images of models are giving children and young people a false view of how "normal" people look, and are creating a unhealthy environment where we are not valuing individuals who are perceived as "less than perfect".' I completely agree with this view, and the fact that photography is having such a big impact on young people today is almost disturbing. From smoothing skin and getting rid of wrinkles, to enlarging muscles and slimming waists, airbrushing men and women to almost ''perfection'' has become the absolute norm in the advertising media. These images don't reflect reality at all, yet from a younger and younger age, people are aspiring to these impossible bodies. 

The art of airbrushing is so simple that there is no excuse for an image to hit the front of a magazine without a little tweaking. Add a little tan, nip a little waist, slightly larger breasts and wallah! But...I think the impact of the airbrushing is not completely realized as almost every women's magazine uses it to change the way the models look. But why? What is so wrong with a natural body? I suppose it is just one of those questions that is yet to be answered...

Dramagraphies

This week, I was having a flick through 'F Stop' and the featured artist was really interesting to me. The photographer was Michel Lagarde, and his featured pieces were a series of self portraits. The reason I have chosen to blog about his work is because I found it really appealing how every single image was different to the next. He was dressed differently, in a different place, pulling a different expression. I could not help but look at every single image to see quite how much they differed. 

The creativity with Lagarde's portraits are second to none, and have really inspired me to look more into self portraits. It has shown me that taking a picture of yourself does not have to be simple and it does not have to be vain. His way of showing himself in different environments is creative and really interesting to the eye. "Talking about my work is quite difficult for me, lets just say that this project is a result of practising different forms of art and that I wanted to put together: in theatre, both as an actor and a decorator - painting, photography and the pleasure of ''story telling''. Recomposing photos where all these different forms of art are present, but most of all showing a snapshot of images in my head which have been formed since childhood." 

"It is not so much of myself that appears in "Dramagraphies", it is rather the different roles that I have interpreted as an actor. Having that distance is important as less of me project in these images rather than keeping them within me. Naturally, the images come from within me, but I am not relating my life, I am having fun interpreting them without any regard for my physical appearance, which I tend to deform more than anything else."

Gunter Brus

Wow, so, from reading 'The Photo Book', I came across the 'Self Portrait' project by Gunter Brus. The images took my by surprise because they are rather disturbing...yet intriguing. Brus covered himself in a whit paste, and marked with a brush a line of what might be dark stitches from his scalp to his neck. It really looks as if he has been opened up and put back together again. 

The make up skills that Brus has shown in this project are superb and really creative. I particularly like the way that he has chosen to show one piece of apparatus that could have given him the injury in each image. This makes the viewer wonder what happened to him and what was his inspiration - was his inspiration a real life event? So, apart from the really creative art work on his own face, Brus really involves the viewer by giving off some mixed narratives. It reminds me of Orlan; an artist who had a variety of plastic surgery on herself in the name of art; to be something completely different and to push the boundaries of the art world. Although this is not as dramatic and permanent, it does remind me of the story because Brus has changed the way he looks in the name of art. Also, to some it may be quite disturbing, as the work or Orlan was to me.

Interesting

While researching, I came across a rather different look at Photography. It was called '100 photos taken at unusual angles' - although the site is intended for a humorous purpose, I found the images really clever and interesting. The majority of the images have been set up to look a certain way:

And some were simply a misjudgment of the angle...

I think that these images, where the composition is not intended to be a certain way, are incredibly creative and interesting to the eye. All are down to a talented photographer who caught each shot at a fantastic moment in time. 

Life Hurts

I came across Zach Gold while undergoing some research for another project. In all honesty, I liked every single piece of Gold's work. In particular I really enjoyed his series of work, "Life Hurts". This project portrays a number of images showing people clearly hurting themselves. They are all in black and white, bu I think this added contrast really emphasizes what is being shown in the photos.

The images that I have chosen here would have to be my favourite. Gold has captured each incident either in mid air or during it happening. I think this is both clever and visually aesthetic. The fact that each image has the words 'life hurts' printed clearly over the situation, makes the viewer engage more with what is actually happening.