OBJECT & BODY UNIT ASSESSMENT

Neda Mockeviciute

Context for Body part of the project

In this project I want to focus on immigration. I am a foreigner myself and difficulties, such as cultural differences, language barrier, inspired me to create my project about it.
Therefore, my initial idea for this project was to take photos of non-UK citizens who works in corner shops, find out what rises and falls they experienced while living abroad and perpetuate it in my images. Similarly their stories might help me to cope with my hardships.

Contextual research
UK Immigration : The major components of migration: Asylum About 2 per cent of the worlds refugee population live in the UK. The number of people seeking asylum in the UK peaked in the early 2000s with 84,130 applications in 2003. It has remained much lower since this point. Students Students comprise the largest group of entrants to the UK each year. In 2010 students, student visitors (up to six months) and their dependants totalled about half a million. Economic migration The Labour government trebled the number of work permits issued from 43,000 in 1997 to 124,000 in 2008.

 Family reunion The government changed the rules in June 1997 so as, in effect, to permit marriage to be used as a means of immigration. The numbers rose by 50% to more than 40,000 per year between 2005 and 2007.

People in Britain are more likely than the people of other nations to view immigration negatively to see immigration as a problem rather than an opportunity, and to view the immigrant population as already too large.

1. 2.

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/immigration-statistics-april-to-june-2013/immigrationstatistics-april-to-june-2013 http://www.migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/briefings/uk-public-opinion-toward-immigration-overallattitudes-and-level-concern

Studio portrait : Lighting inspiration douard Manet This portrait is an inspiration for me. The lighting of this painting, illuminates the face so it is clear, although the shadow on the left side of the outline of the face provides painting with vitality, moreover, because of that it does not look flat and dull. Victorine Meurent, 1862

Visual references
Irving Penn A photographer who has/have done a similar thing is Irving Penn. Although, his image is really contrasty but the main point is still the same. Clear and light face with a shadow on the outline, which alows the viewers to examine it. Al Pacino, New York, 1995

 Andy Gotts This image caught my attention due to its grey background. Grey is a neutral color, therefore, it helps to convey my concept through the sitters expressions, gaze rather than throw the main object into the shade and misguide the audience.

Framing : Richard Avedon The face takes up most of the print space, so the audience are compelled to analyze facial expressions rather than look at sitters clothing. Also close-ups appear to be intimate.

Robin Williams

Composition: Julia Margaret Cameron : The author by chosing central composition secures that the subject will be in the spotlight of attention. The poet Alfred Lord Tennyson

Posture: Zoltan Jokay: This particular image was useful for me, .because of the posture and straight gaze to the camera which signifies that the subject is self-confident. At the same time it also might transfer intimacy.

Strange (2003).

Environmental portrait:
Lucy Levene - 'Portraits' Lucy Levene gives as much attention to details as to the person in front of the camera. She understand that things help to reveal photographed person character, work and etc.

Toby Glanville - 'Food Portraits' These photographs were taken in men work place environment. Camera is positioned at eye-level, this might indicate respect and the notion of equality.

Maggi Hambling, The Saturday Telegraph Magazine

 John Delaney - 'Hoboken Passing' Central composition, in my estimation, helped Delaney not only attract viewers attention where it is needed, but also fill unoccupied space with details, which tells more about the subject.

Nicola Lo Calzo - Inside Niger

This type of composition when the environment takes most of the frame might be understood as a trap, from which the person is too small to escape.

Nassim & Mohammed / Slaughterhouse / Niamey / 2009

Giovanni, Italian cobbler

 Gordon Parks Research This picture has influenced my choice of composition. In the photograph below woman appears to trapped between cleaning tools and flag, which might indicate that she cannot escape her destiny.

"American Gothic", 1942

Test shoots

While searching for the most suitable composition I photographed people at eyelevel and used low angle. Also few of them were out of focus, so I had to reshoot my portraits. I have focused on the person itself.

Contact Sheets

I have decided to take photographs on eye level because of this notion of equallity and respect. Focus is on all of the person and his clothing. I asked Umit to wear same clothing as he weares in the shop on a casual day. I chose to photograph studio portrait as a close-up, because I find them more intimate.

Final Prints
Studio print- Positive side of living abroad I chose this photograph in which Umit with all his body and sight is turned straight into the camera. This suggests he is self- confident and as he said do not regret living abroad; it made me more confident and responsiblehe said. I have used this lighting because of clear and light face with a shadow on the outline, which alows the viewers to examine it while grey background does not distract viewers attention from the main object.

 Negative side of living abroad

I have used natural shop lighting to keep notion of reality in the pictures. Although, pictures would have been so much better if I have used polorizing filter or additional light source. I have chosen this image, because the shelves trap Umit and this might represent the difficulties he had and still has to cope with while living abroad. As I got to know Umit better I found out that he finished law school in Egypt, however, when he moved to England the only job he was offered was to be a salesman in corner shop. As Umit himself says he feels trapped in his current work place.

Self Evaluation
Project is based on societies trend to search for a better life abroad.

Nonetheless, it might go different from your original plan. For instance, Umit thought that he will straight away start working as a lawyer when he moves to England, although companies seem to ignore his degree obtained in Egypt and the work he got since he came here had not changed and is not that satisfying. From my point of view, time management for body project was poor compared with the other part of unit. This happened because my participant had health issues and shooting was rescheduled and after that canceled because of his condition. Luckily both of us managed to find free time and I took the photographs.

In the future I suppose it is a good idea to have more participants for your project. Because as I have learned from this part of unit, accidents happen and you might not be in control of it.

 I had some issues while printing environmental portrait. It was taken in a shop where lighting was poor, moreover, the only light source was above our heads, therefore, the images had a same problem as my object unit print, the lower part of person had not much tonal range in the shadow, so some of the clothing detail is missing. It only confirms that I need to be more aware of every aspect of the image. The most challenging part of this unit was searching for participants and being able to react quickly and stay calm in unexpected situations. I found this part of the project much harder due to absolute dependence on other people. Furthermore, I am of the opinion that environmental portrait could be better if I have used additional light source. I am aware that my studio portrait is printed in high contrast and because of it I am losing texture of the face and details in blacks, but, in my estimation, this print is what I wanted it to look like.

Context for Object part of the project

My object idea is concerned with social issue of addiction (to alcohol, drugs, cigarettes). I have concentrated on death, the tension between at first being pure, undamaged and fresh, but then being affected by the addiction and become something unwanted, decaying.I suppose to express my idea for this project by using symbolical obejct meaning.

Addiction is a state of being enslaved to a habit or practice or to substance that is psychologically or physically habit-forming to such an extent that its cessation causes severe trauma. Addict is a person who is dependent on a substance.

Contextual research
I was looking for specific information about what damage has alcohol, drugs and smoking to humans body, how it affects people around them. Alcohol impact on health: Brain: Alcohol interferes with the brains communication pathways, and can affect the way the brain looks and works. o o o o Heart: Drinking cause problems including: Stretching and drooping of heart muscle Irregular heart beat Stroke High blood pressure

Cancer: Drinking too much alcohol can increase your risk of developing certain cancers, including cancers of the: mouth, throat, liver, breast

Immune System: Drinking too much can weaken your immune system, making your body a much easier target for disease.

Smoking impact on health: Tobacco use most commonly leads to diseases affecting the heart and lungs and will most commonly affect areas such as hands or feet with first signs of smoking related health issues showing up as numbness. The usage of tobacco also increases rates of infection: common cold, bronchitis and chronic bronchitis. Cancer , particularly lung, mouth, larynx, stomach, cancers and cervical cancer for women. Social and behavioral Medical researchers have found that smoking is a predictor of divorce. Smokers have a 53% greater chance of divorce than nonsmokers. Recent studies have linked smoking to the broad class of anxiety disorders, and not limited to just depression.

Drugs impact on: Family or relationship problems - The person might be prone to mood swings, violent outbursts and other forms of extreme behavior. Work - The employee may changed to someone who is late for work, has neglected their appearance and personal hygiene and is displaying unacceptable levels of behavior, not completed their duties or stealing from colleagues or the company. Personality- Addicted people may become offensive, self-harm, selfconcentratedlie, paranoiac, cheat, steal, restlessness, low self-esteem. Financial problems- The person who is suffering from an addiction may be in financial difficulties which can lead to criminal behavior. Health problems - HIV/AIDS, Hepatitis C and etc. Narcotic drugs have adverse effects on vision, hearing and the cardiovascular system. Also, narcotics reduce the activity of central nervous system.
1. 2. 3. 4. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCcovkscxck http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-15114325 www.collegedrinkingprevention.gov/collegestudents/anatomy/body_nonflash.aspx http://www.heart.org/HEARTORG/GettingHealthy/QuitSmoking/QuittingSmoking/How-CigarettesDamage-Your-Body_UCM_322735_Article.jsp

Visual references
Luciana Rondolini The thing that attarcted me to these instalations was the idea of taking something taht appeared to be beautiful, pure and then let it to decay or etc. Furthermore, it impelled me to choose decaying flowers as my photographic object. 2012 As long as you love me

2012 As long as you love me

2012 My Silver Path

2012 My Silver Path

 Irving Penn: 'Cigarettes What I found interesting and valuable for my project is the simplicity of the frame, careful arrangement of objects, central composition which might represent the importance of the subject, its metaphor and symbolical meaning.

Robert Mapplethorpe - 'Flowers' This picture made me think about flower composition within in the frame, vase in which the flowers will be photographed. Therefore, I used the same flower composition and because water is a sign of life and because I wanted to see the stem I made a decision to photograph flowers in a transparent vase without water in it.

From the Suite: Flowers

Irving Penn. Cigarette No 17, New York, 1972.

 Danny Treacy- Grey Areas and Jay Bing- Fruits These photographers inspired me to paint my objects to succeed in conveying my idea. At first I thought of painting my flowers grey, nevertheless, there is a stronger connection between death and black color rather than grey color.

2002, 150 x 200 cm, Archival Photograph. Edition of Five.

 Billy Kidd Beautiful Decay These rooting flowers might become a metaphor for decaying human body because of addictions they have. Moreover, light from above gives audience no other choice but to focus on the bloom and analyze every detail, every wrinkle carefully.

Irving Penn - Still Life with Watermelon, 1947 Studio lighting This still life photograph by Irving Penn is my inspiration for studio lighting. This image caught my attention because of table top and the background distinction. However, the background from my perspective is still too bright, therefore I am thinking about darker background because I wanted a clearer line which distinguishes table from the background.

Still Life with Watermelon, 1947

Test Shoot
Experimented with lighting, tried to lighten up the background. Experimented with flower composition. Unfortunately, these images were not suitable for my idea, because of the composition. The scene looked too messy and caressly assembled.

Contact Sheet

This picture arrangement is perfectly suitable for my concept, the set does look organised and natty. I have decided to take photograph on eye level to possition the viewer in first person narrative.

Final Prints

I used symbolism to help me convey the concept. I took objects with positive symbolical meaning ,such as lilies (purity), daisies (innocence) and red rose (love). And painted them black (death, evil) or dried it, took the life out. Moreover, not only flowers in this image has symbolical meaning. The table cloth is dyed to be yellow, which stands for violence or decay. Flowers, table-cloth is in focus because it is the things that has symbolical meaning and have to be analysed by the audience to understand the concept.

Analogue

Digital print

Self Evaluation
Project is based on current societies issues of addiction. This problem is still arising and every year younger and younger kids in UK are drawn to addiction world. Alcohol, cigarettes and drugs has negative impact on our lives, it disturb addicts themselves and people around them. In my estimation, I managed my studies quite well, all the work was done step by step. In the future I need to do more test shoots which helps not only for developing your visual choices but also to see the drawbacks of lighting, composition and etc.

I had problems with printing. My choice of lighting had some drawbacks, such as shadow on the stem, which might have been easily fixed by one more light source directed to the vase and stem. Because of this failure I had to use a certain technique in the darkroom. My exposure on enlarger was 2.5 of a second, such short exposure compress the tonal range of the image and makes the object stand out more. According to this I will be more considered the next shooting time.

 The most difficult part of this unit half was figuring out how I can transfer my selected issue of addictions and controlling all mine of photographic decisions, chosen object symbolism to be clear and communicate with audience. I will definitely be more aware of these choices when photographing further on. Moreover, I think the image could have been stronger if I have used another source of light. Matching analogue and digital prints was also a challenge for me, because of wrong exposure measurements made during shooting in studio. My analogue print has cyan cast on it and is quite flat compared to my digital print. Furthermore, I have to be more selfconfident and aware of how important every aspect of the photograph is while shooting in the studio rather than trying to fix it in the darkroom. This project is mostly based upon my contextual research as I have mentioned in earlier presentation I still find it quite challenging, although much easier then in the first project.