Artists Statement
From a young age, I have had a strong passion for art, writing stories, pictures and music. It developed into wanting to photograph and document what is going on in the world; the different life-styles, culture, people. People have always inspired me – I am always interested in meeting and getting to know new ones. To capture and spend time creating a meaningful photograph filled with a story, which others can look at and feel different feelings. The idea of walking through a place and be able to admire the beauty of the world and be able to capture it is wonderful. I found a fascination for natural light, and this was soon discovered after spending some time with a Photographer who lived in a really calm place, in a house full of soft colours and wooden floors. Home is where you feel the safest, and the most comfortable in my opinion, and when you admire the world as much as I do, it’s a wonderful feeling to capture the essence of the place, the light peering through the windows, and photograph the textures and tones giving it a sense of reality. I often find myself feeling a lot calmer looking at the world through a lens.
For me, I feel Photography is more than taking a photo of something or focusing incredible amounts on the technical side of everything. Of course, the settings are important, and I have learnt how to use the correct Shutter-speeds, apertures, ISO, white balance and so on in order to get the correct exposure, however what I find is the most important is to capture the emotion. The composition and vantage point can catch the eye so much better. Who says an out of focus image is a bad photograph?
Photography stands out the most to me when I am able to capture raw emotions around me
– To be able to photograph that gleaming smile coming from someone’s face during an event, or capture a part of someone’s personality which strikes many people and in one frame is so inspiring.
Since a child, I was brought up with music. Folk music, especially. My mother, brother and Uncle
’s all play guitar and sing and I picked up their guitar one day and taught myself. Since then, I have played an array of songs and been incredibly inspired by everything I’ve listened to, which then led to having a like for music photography. Everybody expresses themselves through something, and the idea that people can sing in melodies through playing different instruments and portraying their thoughts with something that pleases them and other people really stands out to me. I adore capturing their expressions in music, using shallow depth of field and strange angles and indicating what type of emotion they’re feeling in a photograph.
This Assignment.
For this assignment, we have been asked to portray the way we think of Family. I love the idea of using a shallow depth of field, soft, subtle colours and focusing on documenting the way my home is. Home is where you feel comfortable and you go to when you're feeling down and I feel that could be an idea to document. When I think of a home, I begin to think about the idea of having a family. - A mother, father, sister's and brother's. For me, I have separated parents and my brother and sister are away at University. I could try and capture the essence of being on my own and get a sense of dreams and light. Another idea I thought about was to capture certain facial features that are similar to my own of my families and be able to create quite abstract photographs. Using a black and white theme and wide apertures could work really well.
Perhaps use the idea of photographing how my parents were brought up - Maybe capture teddies of my Father's childhood or clothing back from my mother's teens.
Recently, I've lost many family members and it has been a really difficult time. When both my grandparents passed away within 2 months of each other, the house which they lived in kept many memories that we had shared in. Where we went all the time as children to swim in their pool, play boardgames and spend time with them. It took me a few months to actually set foot in the house, although realised perhaps I would feel a bit better when I do. After discussing it with a friend for a while, I thought about photographing the house and document what created so many happy times for my family therefore helping me.
Another idea was to try a bit of manipulation and portray myself "living out of bags and boxes." With my parents being separated, I move to my mum's and dad's house every week. and never really get the time to actually un-pack quite often. Perhaps do some cloning or double exposures.
I'm not too pleased with this photo, as I don't feel it's strong at all, however I achieved my dream-like edit aim and wanted it to portray the idea that I lived out of a suitcase.
Artist Research.
I thought I would talk about Nancy Briscoe again. - Her looking "through small eyes" project really stood out to me.
Shallow depth of field and low vibrancy catches my eye because of it's delicate, and soft appeal. When I thought more into the idea of home, it made me think of the dolls house my grandparents made me as a child. They made it to look just like their house - White with black lines. They put wallpaper, carpets, bath tubs, people, beds and all the bits and bobs you'd usually see in a dolls house.
Ideas
I was unable to collect my dollhouse, although I'm now going to photograph my mum's puppets, which she had when she was a child. They're now all tangled after moving houses and around.
Following from my artist research, style of my previous photograph, admiration for story telling and knowledge of my mother's upbringing, I felt this idea suited well. I'm pleased with my photographs and use of shallow depth of field giving the final images quite a dream-like, subtle effect linking into the fairy-tale, child-like theme. I enjoyed finding natural light in my house, before I took these photographs I just wandered round the house capturing any light I could see creating lovely tones on the walls and floor. Recently we pulled up the carpet and found all the old tiles underneath and they're beautiful. When the light hits them, it's wonderful.
