Cindy Sherman, dressing up...

  Dressing up was a popular thing to do when I was a little girl. it was normal for girls to dress up barbie dolls, or themselves, trying on their mothers clothes, wearing high heels and playing different roles. There is no apparent reason or rationale behind most of those costumes, which makes sense given it's only when we are little and not aware of the real world. One person however has found that dressing up can conjure up different accounts from different people at anytime. In these images, photographer and artist Cindy Sherman redefines dressing up by presenting self-portraits of other people through herself. But how can we judge an adult woman which still is playing with her identity? It's hard to judge her, and her work, even after going through most of her photographs, as there's some ambiguity as to who, what and why Sherman photographs these women in the first place. 
  I think maybe that's because all of the women posing on her images are Sherman herself being different people through the same medium. These self-portraits aren't self-portraits after all, but rather commentaries on cultural stereotypes of women in popular media and society as a whole. 

The New York Times, Cindy Sherman Unmasked

http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2012/02/19/arts/design/20120219-SHERMAN-7.html

  Sherman first came to the public's attention when she presented her Untitled Film Stills. Here, she photographs herself in black-and-white in different costumes and locations which are reminiscent of Hollywood films of the golden age. Sherman left those images untitled so that the viewers would be able to come up with stories of their own. However even with the images alone, it's easy to cast these women in stereotypical roles of the devoted housewife, the loyal secretary, the sultry romantic interest or some other generic plot device.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/19/arts/design/moma-to-showcase-cindy-shermans-new-and-old-characters.html?pagewanted=all

  She continued to act out roles for her photographs, at one time reenacting nobles and aristocrats in old paintings in her history portraits, at another donning on the colorful and sometimes scary makeup of clowns, becoming both anonymous and recognized in her artworks.
  On a very basic level, Sherman is simply acting out characters from her imagination, on a deeper level she discards her own identity to portray that of another for a split-second, and on an even deeper level, she tears down the very definition of photography that what is in captured by the camera is objective and truthful.
Or this could all be just Sherman's way of fulfilling her childhood wishes of dressing up through her life. Part of me feels jealous that she can still play like I did as a little girl, but although she has grown up, she's taken the game of dressing up to another level.

The New York Times, Cindy Sherman Unmasked, Carol Vogel, 16/02/2012

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/19/arts/design/moma-to-showcase-cindy-shermans-new-and-old-characters.html?pagewanted=all

Other Realities, the beauty of analog dream. (book)

  Today with the age of digital cameras and photoshop, we don't really think about going to the dark room and spend several hours on developing our images if we can achieve similar effect in half the time. It's a shame that the technology has taken over the magic of analogue photography. Photography masters like Jerry Uelsmann are much more rare now a days. His darkroom skills allowed him to create evocative images that combined the realism of photography and the fluidity of our dreams. I think that the alchemy of the photographic process is strongly tied to his creative visions. His work inspires, helps to keep the analog photography and multiple exposure techniques a life. 

(from book p.25)

There is a Zen saying: "When the student is ready, the Master appears." I would like to dedicate this selective retrospective to my incredible teachers: Ralph Hatterslay, Minor White, Beaumont Newhall, and Henry Smith. Each of the individuals answered my questions with more interesting questions. 

                                                                                                              - Jerry Uelsmann 

(Jerry Uelsmann, Other Realties, p.5)

  This dedication from his book shows his masters and influences. Uelsmann creations are full of questions, he is promoting "doubts" as a positive and essential force with in the process of discovery. His photographs are a curious mixture of themes, motifs, and sensibilities. I treasure the fact that in his prints every one might find something different, for example elements of expressionism, photography as self knowledge, as comedy, as reflection. By looking at his book I see elements of mystery and romance. 

Many of his images include the bodies of beautiful women, usually asleep and dreaming, which gives the feeling of a romantic dream.  Clouds is the other element. 

MESSAGE TO YOU... (e-resources)

  In what way do we use social network?
  To communicate with our friends, to share information about our life, to keep in contact...
We seem to know just the good side of those networks, we don't even think about other ways, but what about countries without free speech, countries where there is war and government hides everything, where the news are role by power of the government. In Iran protesters are using Facebook and Twitter to ensure that news of their demonstrations and brutal repression reaches the outside world.
  Protesters have struggled to be heard on media channels, so they turned to social networks, posting images and tweets about the situation that they are in. Those protesters are struggling with free speech issue, with tight internal media restrictions, but the power of freedom is so strong that they find the way of reaching the networks, they access them via proxy servers, this allows them to stay anonymous. On those images we can see that protesters are both male and female, groups of all ages, what is not clear is what is really going on and how much trust we can put in to those images.

British Journal of Photography, Message to you, 01/07/2009, p.11

  I looked on You tube as the writer Julian Lass suggested and find a film "Basijis are shooting at civilians" and from this short recording it is very hard to say what is really going on. Some of the men are blurred, running away from the shootings, on other recording we see a man shooting one way, in seconds maybe hundreds of men are running towards him. Those are films of news reports and as we think they can't lie, but it paints a very bleak picture, who is shooting and who is running away.

  In all that we have to think about the power of online networking, that so many of us ignore. 

Born in Moldova, activist and journalist Natalia Morar started a tweet about a demonstration, she expected at most a couple of hundred friends and colleagues, but with power of Twitter 15,000 turned up to the square, mostly young people with access to the internet.

British Journal of Photography, Message to you, 01/07/2009, p.12

British Journal of Photography, Message to you, Julian Lass, 01/07/2009

Documentary still life- books

   For ages people try to preserve history, attempts at conservation may slow down decay, but they can't stop it. Items that we save are usually, objects of special importance. Either sentimental like for example something that was left behind by our ancestors or historical carefully kept in museums. What is important most of all is the authenticity of those objects, the authentic emotions.

  Photography has this special power to record a moment, moment which in the minute that the photographer presses the shutter is change to become history. I looked at three photographers which projects are about relationships between the cultural heritage and the creations of contemporary culture. Each of these photographers wants to show us the importance of our cultural heritage, but every one of them has his or her own vision of doing that.

  Wijnanda Deroo
 Her photographs are as authentic as the places on them, she concentrates on small areas of the room almost like she wants us to concentrate on personalities of the owners. By looking at these images I feel like I can tell the story of some ones life, they are very straight forward. Deroo, doesn't move any objects in the rooms or play tricks with the light, she documents the places as she finds them. By photographing this way she creates a question in my head, will these objects have the same impact, atmosphere and authenticity if they will be displayed in a museum? No, because it is not just about an object, is more than that,  it's about people, about feelings, about tradition. Many of those places don't exist any more which shows us even more how important are those images for our cultural heritage.

  

  Mirjam de Zeeuw

 Mirjam says about her self ; "I'm not a photographer, I just use photography" (page 49) I think that she chose photography as a best medium to understand how important preservation of our historical heritage is. Her photographs are fragmental, even if she wants to show the whole process, she decides that showing just most important part of the reconstruction is more valuable. By looking at those images I understand that she wants us to appreciate the uniqueness of those objects, that reproductions, or in fact fakes very poorly measure up to what the real objects offer. Those images show the cultural preservation, which happens in the museums behind close doors of laboratories and how every object, whether it is a painting or a carpet, is carefully taken care of to slow down the decay. Zeeuw photographs are supposed  to remind us about irreplaceability of cultural heritage. Her work is about the passing of things, but more than that, it is about our passing by of things.

  Wout Berger 

 Bergers images are made from composing smaller images in to a collage, in fact six of them. Each one  is about something different; colonial history, shipping, painting, anatomy, typography and war, and at the same time all of them are about the same, all of them are collections. Looking at those images I can notice that some of them have been taken in museums, others more than likely on the streets. He almost tries to prove that we need more than one image to understand that important subjects like history and cultural heritage. Berger, like the other two photographers, is taking close ups, which have a big emphasis on the subject. Strong points of the collage is that it is made from lots of smaller images, in the same way like reality is made from different elements, and everyone of us will see it differently, but in fact there is just one reality.

So all of those photographers document our cultural heritage, all visually different but with the same impact on authenticity, like the experts in the museums are not interested if the painting is beautiful but if is genuine, if is painted by artist in his own hand, not by someone else, at some other time. 

Andy Goldsworthy. Web.

http://www.ucblueash.edu/artcomm/web/w2005_2006/maria_Goldsworthy/TEST/index.html (04/02/2012, at 01.00pm)

     

  Andy Goldsworthy is a British installation artist. He works with nature using natural materials like  stones, leaves,  twigs, flowers, snow and ice... He collaborates with nature, some of his creations don't last long so while he is working he writes a notebook, and when his work is completed he takes photographs of his creations. His work we can call "conversation with nature", his sculpture reminds me of geometry, place, time, seasons, history and space. Mathematical understanding of space and time but in artistic visions.


  From beginning snow was a vital material for his creations. Goldsworthy is fascinated by snow, he explain that in his own words,

"... it is in the nature of snow to contradict. It turns the dark earth white – it can fall softly, or with a vigour that hurts. It is at the same time tough, gentle, dangerous, delicate, powerful, and hard.” (on line) 

  I understand his attraction to this sculptural material, because as a child I loved to build from snow and watch my formations melt down and been given back to the earth.
His snow creations like melting of dirty and gritty snowball from New York City streets, has more hidden context, I read to it as a part of the damage which big city make to our word. On the other hand idea of Shadow Snow Fold, in which the artist performs in real time with snow falling gently on a massive stone at the Yorkshire Sculpture Park in England, makes me think about all those pure places.
 http://www.decordova.org/art/exhibition/andy-goldsworthy-snow (04/02/2012,at 11.20)
  Andy's observations of snow are still continued, his next idea is to build a Snow House, according to the artist,

“the work is not an object, but a container—a forum for change, memory, replenishment, season—in which the construction and care of the object, along with its interaction with people, are integral to the work.” (on line)

http://www.decordova.org/snow-house (04/02/2012, at 11.30)
  When he works on his visions he uses  materials in their place of origin, because he wants nature to respond, he wants to feel the space and surroundings with in the subject. In his work Herd of Arches he uses stone from the quarry which was used in eighteen and nineteenth century buildings in Glasgow.

 http://www.sculpture.org.uk/andygoldsworthy/sculpture/herd-of-arches/ (04/02/2012, at 12.00pm)

  I think that his philosophy is to shape and understand nature, to see changes through the years even if his creations are just temporary like leaves polished, made in the shadow of the tree from which they fell, pinned to the ground with thorns or slits cut into frozen snow in stormy strong wind, he knows that by composing something in that space, enables his touch to stay in the heart of the nature.

"I cannot explain the importance to me of being part of the place, its seasons and changes. Fourteen years ago I made a line of stones in Morecambe Bay. It is still there, buried under the sand, unseen. All my work still exists in some form." (on line)

http://www.ucblueash.edu/artcomm/web/w2005_2006/maria_Goldsworthy/philosophy.html (04/02/1012, at12.30pm)
   

http://www.lgblog.co.uk/2009/06/andy-goldsworthy/ (06/02/2012, at 8.37pm)

Typologies. Identifying types. (journals)

Typology is the study of types, and a photographic typology is a suite of images or related forms, shot in a consistent, repetitive manner; to be fully understood, the images must be viewed as a complete series.

Photographers create different visions of this subject, some photograph buildings, other people, and subject of importance.

Brian Ulrich creates  series of images, recording thrift stores, huge market for secondary goods created by consumers culture's throwaway profligacy in quieter, more considered images shot on 4x5 camera.

Next photographer I came across David White and article "The Distance of Nearness". By photographing women, all in the same way and placing them next to images of nature, he attempt to make us think about how close we can seem to be and yet how far we have still to go in our understanding of nature. While the woman who appear in this work are surrounded by natural landscape, they remain capable of independent thoughts, which may yet suggest shared human anxieties.

                                                                                      

In 2007 Andre Penteado resive a news about his father (72) suicide. As a part of his mourning he decide to photograph all of his father clothing. We can think, who or what, are we invited to consider when looking at this body of work?

Chuck Close.......... daguerreotype.....

The body as an aesthetic object... (book stock)

 Did you ever dream of having an aesthetic body?

In my journey through all those books in the library I found lots of images which I could consider of being  aesthetic, perfect, beautiful.  Mostly in fashion I noticed faultless images of the human figure. James Wedge in his "Painted Ladies" shows attractiveness and charm of his models, enhancing it with the art of hand colouring, this technique allowed him to be selective, unique, deliberately restricted and to show his objects in the most aesthetic way.

Painted Laides, James Wedge (plate 49,27,21)

His images are full of sexuality but with nothing obvious.

On the other hand I looked at a book by Bettina Rheims & Serge Bramly "Chambre Close", this book looks at aesthetic in a different way, very straight forward. These images show women as a sexual object, still in the beautiful way. However, it seems like she is there just for male pleasure, to be looked at over and over, to be a fantasy.

Chambe Close, Bettina Rheims & Serge Bramly, p.35,37

In Ornela Vorpsi's book called "Nothing Obvious", the author shows images which some people could argue are unsightly and impersonal rather than aesthetic. Her images do not show any thing obvious, nothing disturbing. However, a lot is left to the viewers imagination and is dependant on  how we want to see these photographs, or even in what mood we are in.

Ornela Vorpsi, Nothing Obvious

In a similar case we can think about nude bodies of elderly people, Melanie Manchot in "Look at you loving me"presents a series of aesthetic images which show the bodies of elderly women. These photographs are aesthetically complex and it's meaning must be mined.

From my research I realised that the body as an aesthetic object can be looked and understood differently depending on the viewer. The book which really helped me to understand what I see as aesthetic was "LOVE & DESIRE" by William A. Ewing, this book is a collection of images which takes us to the heart of affection, longing, pleasure, sexuality and adoration. Looking through those images I understood that the aesthetic body could be something different to every one of us.