Industry vs Culture Still Life

Here are some examples of my final few pieces with the triptychs:

PicMonkey Collage

I don’t really like this one as there is too many contrasting colours like the blues and oranges. The central image is also burry so I won’t continue with this piece.

I then looked at including the banana within the piece because I think it’s a very interesting picture and it makes the pictures stand out. My issues with this collection is that the end image appears out of focus and slightly darker than the first image.

Collage

Finally I think I have decided on my complete piece. I really like how these photos contrast and how the lighting drags you immediately to the first image and then the complete piece. I also like how the photos are in full as opposed to cropped like they are in the photos above. I like how the consistency is broken up by the banana and how this could be interpreted in a multitude of ways. The darker images appear more brooding and mysterious and are then juxtaposed by a brighter image on a different background; I really like this as the whole piece appears chaotic and yet at the same time almost calming.

Still life basic ideas

Another point that I didn’t mention was that the images have to be based on Industry Vs Culture (whilst still being Still Life of course). So, with that in mind and based on my research and my inspiration from Stephanie Gonot and Irving Penn, here are some examples of Still Art that I took:

I feel like these images could represent Industry Vs Culture due to the symbolism of the pieces. The eggs represent the culture and the chess pieces represent industry. In my images, the chess pieces are in the eggs, this could be argued that the industry is dominating the culture (in this example agriculture). The eggs are more or less destroyed by the chess pieces and that could be argued as the over-growing power of industry and capitalism.
I haven’t yet edited these images and I feel like the background is possibly too textured as it clashes with the blue print of the plate in the final images. I also feel like these images are pretty odd and most people won’t understand what the message is; I wanted to create something unique but I don’t want the message to get lost.

I also took this image in my kitchen; the banana is balanced on the hob. I really like this photo as the darkness of the hob contrasts with the brightness of the banana. I also like how out of place the red lipstick is; I would like to somehow incorporate this image within my orange photos of eggs and chess pieces. I think this describes Industry vs Culture because the lipstick is representative of women and the banana is typically an innuendo and a phallic image. Industry vs Culture therefore is how the Industry has sexulised both the representation of females and how cultural society is combatting that by destroying the phallic imagery.

I have a lot of mixed ideas about this project.

Still Life

“Still life photography is a genre of photography used for the depiction of inanimate subject matter, typically a small group of objects.” [1] From this wikipedia article quote, it can be understood that still life photography are images of objects that don’t move, examples of this would include objects like flowers and food. Still life photography allows the photographer to have complete and utter control when taking a photo, as the artist can arrange how to the composition is arranged and altered. Unlike portraiture, the equipment needed to take a still life photo is a lot less due to how big or small the objects are.

One of the most famous photographers of still life photography is Irving Penn.

Penn’s still life compositions were “sparse and highly organized”. They were mainly abstract collections of food. Penn’s photographs are composed with a great attention to detail, which is something I would like to incorporate within my own pieces. Something I would like to focus on is black and white imagery and how to create images that reflect well in black and white. Penn is renowned for his black and white prints. This is due to the fact that due to their deep contrast, it gives the image a clean, crisp look.

Here is some of his artwork:

I really like his still life based on food because they look so out of place and unusual. When making my own still life I think I would like to create something similar. Food is something I feel like I would like to incorporate because it can be easily shaped and altered to make something more unique, much like Penn’s artwork. However, I want to make the images a lot more brighter and colourful as his images are quite dark and dull, especially the one of the apple and the brie.

I would preferably like to incorporate food as it would be unusual to see in still life items like Capri Suns, pancakes, cookies and such when the basis for still life tends to focus more on the traditional aspect. Like for example in Penn’s work he focus on vegetables, meats and cheeses. I would like to create a modern take on this artwork.

When exploring the modern take on traditional still life photography I discovered Stephanie Gonot.

I originally found her because she did a shoot for a website called Nasty Gal:

I really love how vibrant the images are and how the pieces have been arranged. I like how the pink contrasts with the black and greys and by doing this it highlights the gold in the shoe. Whilst I was researching her, I found that she also took photos of food in the non traditional sense.

Here are some more examples of her work:

I really like the pastel backgrounds and lighting she has included. The use of the sweet products in the first images makes it look like the series has a theme for each photo i.e. sweets, however the contrasting use of meat and grapefruits make the picture more in depth due to the different textures. From this I would like to base some of my work on her art style.

Within this brief, we have to present the photos in a triptych.

What is a Triptych?

A triptych is one image that incorporates three other images, often relating in at least one particular way. It is typical for each image to be combined to show multiple viewpoints of the same place or to present images within a certain theme. (ephotozine, (2015). Within this style, you can have creative control of how they are presented for example, they could be diagonal or horizontal.

This is a triptych by a blogger called Melinda Anderson. I really love how she’s chosen to set the colours in a sort of serpia setting and how detailed the photos are. I also like how they’re sort of the same picture, but from different angles.

This was created by Nicholas Grundy and I like it because the only thing that connects these photos are the different textures of the photos. I also like the use of blue within each photograph.