The World Around Me

Inspired by this weeks lecture that examined Cartier-Bresson and Lee Freidlander, I was intent on capturing moments from everyday life using the convenience of my digital camera. On Saturday morning I made my way to the Victoria Markets for food shopping. The array of fruit and vegetables provided a visually interesting backdrop for the bustle of people and the exchange of goods. From the photographs I have uploaded I particularly like one where the man is purchasing a pumpkin. Unaware that I was photographing either of them I was able to capture an ordinary moment in time. I also was quite pleased with the compositional elements in the photograph.

First Experimentation With An SLR

Given a list of 12 words to inspire and spark interest in the world around us we were all sent out with a camera each for experimentation. Having never used an SLR, my main focus was composition with limited experiment with manual function. I would, however, like to become more familiar with the manual function of a digital SLR. The photos attached to this blog entry are those which I felt were most successful during the session.

Jill Greenberg and the Developement of Portrait Photography

Greenberg's photographic curiosity is centered in portraiture, a genre which was established with the advent of the camera. Greenberg is a prime example of an artists who has a 'personal vision that is readily identifiable'. While portrait photography of the early 19th century was highly formal, structured and emotionally austere, Greenberg explores the intense emotion and the true identity of her subjects.

Greenberg is known as 'the manipulator', combining harsh lighting in the capture stage with heavy digital editing in Photoshop. Greenberg told Digital Photo Pro that she uses 'a lot of masking, apply colour curves, dodge and burn. It's all done by hand, like painting.' These techniques could be interesting for my own experiment in digitally manipulating photographs in Photoshop.

Greenberg's work is often clouded by controversy, particularly her 'End Times' series in 2006 which featured hyper real, stylized portraits of toddlers. The toddlers were captured in moments of intense emotion, through controversial methods such as offering the child candy and then taking it away, which some deemed unethical. Greenberg, however intended it as a post modern political comment, stating; 'The first little boy I shot, Liam, suddenly became hysterically upset. It reminded me of helplessness and anger I felt towards the current political and social situation. I made me think of my outrage at our false reason for going to war in Iraq and the scandalous way the conflict was sold to the American people'.

The Perpetual Debate - What Is Art?!

Discussions in the workshop brought to light the difficulty of producing ‘fine art photography’ in a climate that has essentially commercialised and made readily available the camera to a mass market. Having never studied photography before, I found myself daunted by the prospect of establishing something unique and distinctly ‘ME’. What could I possible do, that is radically different to anyone else?

I viewed segments from the second series of ‘The Genius of Photography’, which provided a great quote to sum up my quandary:

‘The dilemma and the strength of photography is that it’s the easiest medium in which to be competent, but the hardest medium in which to have a personal vision that is readily identifiable.’

The visual arts has always been a passion of mine, largely practising the in the fields of mixed media painting, drawing, and graphic art I additionally found this comparative quote interesting:

‘There are no accidental masterpieces in painting, but there are accidental masterpieces in photography.’

I think this quote reveals the spontaneity of the medium and therefore the challenge.