Since my initial idea I have been thinking a lot about my own female identity within norms and society. I came to a point where I realised that my own being is shattered and fragmented and always depending on the current situation I am in; it isn't as constant as I thought it was. Gender-wise I feel that my identity is neutral, but because of the society I am constantly reminded about my sex and how my gender should reflect to it by its behavior. The sex also reflects how everyone else perceives me at the first sight; they don't know anything about me but what they see, and what they see is a constitution of DNA, pieces of clothing, make-up and whatnot, which makes them to think an easy answer and quick judgement of me.
Inspiration: photo of Gary Wilson
In my previous entry I questioned the perceiver, who is this person that is looking at the women, where does their gaze fall into. After a lot of pondering I came to realise who is looking at these women of the same background as me; the women are looking at themselves in two different ways. Through the lenses of what they think other people are looking at them, which is always unreal, almost fiction, and when they are alone without thinking themselves on the verve of exhaustion of being a woman with its "responsibilities" and "have-to's" they see themselves stripped from society's norms and expectations, finally alone and "free".
Inspiration: photo by Maria Tasula
After this realisation I knew exactly what I wanted my object to be: a mask made of pieces of different photographs of female faces and body parts under the two different gazes and ten different emotions, shot by the women themselves with a web camera. I want to underline the self portrait of a woman using a web camera to get closer to their own self image; I'm also very interested to use pixelated photos in a large format photograph. To emphasize the fragmentation I want to cover the mask with plastic wrap and cellophane to create more shadows and texture. I'm going to do the test pictures with a medium format camera and take the final picture with a large format camera.
Dear Emilia,
ReplyDeleteI've enjoyed reading your thoughtful and informative blog - it made me want to have a good argument (and I mean that in the good sense of the word) with you face to face. I would first say that the small font of the blog annoyed the hell out of me - I had to make heavy use of the magnifier tool on my laptop to read your words. This idea about identity is really interesting. I never thought much about my own identity until I visited a Welcome Trust exhibition a couple of years ago (http://www.wellcome.ac.uk/News/Media-office/Press-releases/2009/WTX056922.htm) - it made me realise the extent I have, and continue to manipulate my identity.I liked the idea of putting identities into boxes (I think I have a fetish about boxes). I'm a bit confused about your project objectives, you referred to the web camera, how are you going to translate this to analogue and what impact will this have on your concept? Also I'm not clear what your going to photograph? Faces? Or dolls? The former I would have thought is not an object. Hope I'm not being too dimwitted. Best wishes, Chris. Eek! What does Esikatselu mean??
It's a bit unnerving to have the blog instruction in Finnish (it is Finnish?) Think about your poor English speaking fans!
ReplyDeleteDear Emila
ReplyDeleteI seem to have lost the comments I made about your blog, which is a bit aggravating since I said how much I enjoyed and stimulated when reading it. I also said how much I was irritated by the small font which I found made my eyes ache until I found the magnifier control on my laptop. And now I must the confusion caused by the Finnish language instruction which led me to lose my mentorish words of wisdom. Oh well, they weren't all that wise. I like your project but I'm a bit confused about how you are going to go about it. You make interesting comments about using a webcam but how will the immediacy of this concept transfer to the use of an analogue camera. What will change, what will be gained, what will be lost? Also I'm not clear what you are going to photograph, female body or dolls. If the former then I'm not sure how that is an object unless you are talking about the objectification of the female form? Dolls are interesting, are you aware of Hans Belmer and his doll manipulation? Dark and perverse stuff but what would be the female approach? I've certainly felt an uneasy sense of empowerment when I'm manipulated mannequins for photographic purposes. You might also be interested in this article by Germain Greer (http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2007/mar/05/art.gender). Identity is a very interesting approach. I only became aware of my own identity and the extent that I've manipulated it when I visited an exhibition at the Welcome Trust a couple of years ago (see
http://www.wellcome.ac.uk/News/Media-office/Press-releases/2009/WTX056922.htm) I also liked it because I've got a fetish about boxes. Hope these comments are useful - let me know. Best wishes, Chris
Dear Chris,
ReplyDeleteFirst off, thank you for your feedback on my project and blog! I'm sorry to hear that you had difficulties with commenting and reading my text, regarding the former I got all of the comments to my email, and after browsing through my blogger account I found the missing ones in my trash mail. (Thank you for that blogspot.com...) I've tried to fix the layout problems by making the font a bit bigger and changing the language to English; hopefully the blog is now much more approachable than it was before.
As for my object I ended up shooting a mask made of bits of a broken mirror. I would have wanted to make a mask made of different faces of different women by using web camera pictures of different women. This way the pictures would have been more interesting and intimate for they would have been shot of and by the women in the pictures, and after ripping them into tiny fragments and making them as a mask of different faces I would have shot the mask by analogue camera to make another layer of personality (more fragmentation!). Obviously this would have been very tricky and complex object to shoot indeed, which is why I ended up using a broken mirror: it's obvious to a larger audience (which for me it's not interesting, but there we are...) and it's easier to make, even though I've gained seven years of bad luck... Another good point is that the mirror mask is neutral and universal to everyone, regardless of the sex of the viewer, which to me as a woman is interesting and important, because it reflects upon women's rights to be in the same pedestal as men, which to me equals as neutral.
Thank you for the links to the articles, they are very interesting. Germaine Greer's approach to portrayed body scratches something what I have been thinking about and what I would like to change in our society; the image of "a man" and "a woman". Why there is STILL feminine and a real man, and what does it mean to be feminine and a real man; why does our bodies come before our brains - only because our brains reflect first to our bodies and then to our brains? I'm a one to speak about neutral gender approach, yet I'm not saying that our sex don't reflect upon our identities and everyday approach to life but I do think that these underlined gender issues in a today's society (and it is year 2011!) are getting to me in a way of making my brain melt... This is also why I didn't make the mask of faces of different women - I think that I really do not understand what sort of difference a different sex can make to somebody else than me, and that difference to me is very frightening.
...
I'll make a proper post with contact sheets and the final photograph of my object later today.
Thanks again for your comments, it helped me a lot and made me think more precisely (even though you might not have noticed that) about my subject.
Best wishes,
Emilia