Periodicals 'God is in the Details'

Article about photographer michael Thompson, he does lots of work for beauty and fashion magazines. Thompson photographs celebrities such as model, Heidi Klum and actresses Gwyneth Paltrow, Milla Jovovich, Kate Hudson, Selma Blair and Julianne Moore. Quote from Thompson on his work... "There's nothing wrong with an out-of-focus, grainy picture, so many amazing images are like that..." "... you can have a beautifully lit, beautifullt techinical photo but if it doesn't have that feeling behind it, then its really nothing". Thompson has made images for beauty and fashion magazines and its a world where everything has to be perfect. From reading the article it becomes very clear that the more you search for perfection, you start to see the beauty in imperfections. Having celebrity status puts pressure on the person to be 'perfect' bu there is only so much they can do, where as a photographer, with the help of post production work can achieve the perfect image that the magazines want to promote. Professional Photographer, April 2011. 'God is in the Detail' by Joss Stone.

Photography and Race (books)

Identity
Identify, establish identity of; associate (oneself with); treat as identical. Identification, Identity, absolute sameness, individuality, personality.
The everyman English dictionary, DC Browning, 1990.

Race
Descendants of common ancestor; distinct variety, breed: noble birth; peculiar flavour; natural disposition. Suicide; diminution of population by restriction of birth rate.
The everyman English dictionary, DC Browning, 1990.

“The Ugandan child’s hand, in contrast with that of the missionary, looks like the claw of an emaciated bird or something found in an archaeological site.”

This image is by a photographer called Michael Wells he is based in Ilfracombe in North Devon. He used to work as a royal butler before entering a profession in photography. His style is very relaxing and calm.

In this image Wells has managed to capture the difference in race. when I first saw this image I immediately thought of race in history, with white people being more wealthy and black people being poor and used as slaves. And it seems that things are not much different these days there is still no equality people are still living in bad conditions.

The difference in race means this poor African person lives a poor and starving life and the white person a healthy looking person. there is no need for faces in this imge the hands say it all you tell a lot about people from their hands usually something like a profession, but this image shows us a much bigger picture, from the image of just a hand you can see this person is malnutritioned and poor.

I like this style of photography it keeps the image calm, had the photographer used their faces in this image it may have reached out to the audiences emotions which Wells may not have wanted them to connnect with as an audience.

The Photography Book. Phaidon 1997.

Articles Via Athens 'Photography As Identification'

Photography is one of the most reliable forms of identification. Most formal forms of identification tend to be a passport or a licence of some sort, but lots of photographs have ways of making us identify somebody without it being the same old passport photo style with boring lighting and same focal length.

These two images we find more memorable as this is what has been showed to us more often.
The photograph of Saddam Hussein is memorable to us as this is when he was captured and this is what was shown to us on the news.. We didn’t get to see the mug shot of him which is how most people remember other criminal such as Al Capone.

The mug shot of Michael Jackson is one of many similar shots that have documented the surgical changes he has made to his appearance. They have the typical style of the ‘mug shot’ the boring lighting and the size. But using Michael Jackson as an example are they true proof of Identity? This man has changed his face that much that he doesn’t resemble what he used to look like. So what’s to say that they are a reliable type of identification?

http://vnweb.hwwilsonweb.com/hww/results/external_link_maincontentframe.jhtml?_DARGS=/hww/results/results_common.jhtml.44

The Body As An Object Of Medical Research

http://listverse.com/2009/01/08/top-10-bizarre-medical-anomalies/

Above: this article is about rare medical disorders. It shows 10 images of rare diseases exploited to the world for their differences, labelled as freaks. some are normal well known diseases but on a large scale on the individual.
the iages are shocking and disturbing, they are quite hard to look at. It is also uncomforting to think this individual is suffering with this disease and they have to live with the bad publicity they must get for being diferent.
Because some of the mishapen body parts and growths they can appear quite unidentifiable they can look more like an object rather than a living part of the human body. when it comes to the actual research on the human body, the body does need to be treated as an object, if you treated the body as if it still had feelings there wouldnt have been half the medical break throughs there have been in medical history.
On the subject of not treating the body as an object, this way of medical research is quite a humanitarian aproch to thestudy as aposed to soe of the medical testing that happened in history where some of the patients were still alive when the study was taken and most of whom it was against their will.

http://insidevancouver.ca/2010/09/15/body-worlds-exhibit-opens-at-science-world-tomorrow/

This is an article about an exhibition that was held in museums all over the world. The exhibition presents real human bodys that have been preserved and displayed in positions such as hitting a ball. You can see from the photographs all the muscles and tissue that make up the human body. The body's seem to be exploited in front of hundreds of people as if this was never a person with feelings. As the only mammal to have conciousness it's a little unsettling to think they are now being observed as an object and as an unnatural form of the human body.
Obviously all the body in the exhibition have come from people who have given concent for their bodys to be used for medical research, but from a human point of view it is quite hard looking at them without them having a personality.

Recorders...

Many pieces of work that are exhibited in the recorders exhibition require you to use the space around them. For example, 'Pulse Room' requires the long room to present the outcome of each person heart rate reading, as the reading is moved from one end of the room to the other as each heart rate is taken. The piece 'Please Empty Your Pockets' relates to the use of space around it, as it requires man kind to start and one end of it and then move down to the other end. This piece would not have worked if it had been displayed in the corner of the room.

The work re the references the human body as it plays on the five senses, none of the work presented would be classed as art without the presence of a person. For example, 'Please Empty your Pockets' requires humans to engage with the conveyor belt and use their possessions to create the artistic outcome, 'Microphones' requires the voice of a human to create a sound, 'Pulse Index' requires the human fingerprint and displays it in the television set on the wall, 'Autopoiesis' is the most simplistic of all the pieces as it works with the human reflection alone, Close Up' works with a photograph of a persona and presents in it in a mosaic on the television set on the wall, it also displays the persons pulse at the bottom of the screen, 'Pulse Room' uses the human heartbeat to create a glimmering light throughout the room made up of all the heartbeats that have been taken throughout the day, '33 Questions Per Minute' was a personal favourite of mine I felt the use of questioning the mind and portraying it as art. When the room has no people inside all the work will fall back into its non artistic category.

The exhibition suggests humans relate to technology better when they are connected with it. The fact that all Lozano-Hemmer's work needs human interference suggests humans and technology are closely related and work well together. If you look at society in present day, a persons life revolves around technology and technology is a man made thing, so their relationship is a very close one.

I found the work very inspiring art work that expresses the connection between man kind annd technology. I liked the fact that works meaning wasn't very obvious, you had to spend time with the work and interact with it to figure out what its meanign was.