Purpose: Relating the photography back to the Van Gogh chapter.
FACE The new photographic portrait
William A. Ewing
with Nathalie Herschdorfer
0-500-54321-6
Thames and Hudson
20th century body was a dominant theme in photography
We are social animals, not solitary like the tiger or fox
Faces predate human beings
For millennia one's face was destiny, now can be manipulated, changed
Face is a battleground
Mirrors, self-awareness is important
mirror represented a truthful self-image even at risk of their vanity
portrait puts a head in a vise open to scrutiny from others
'the anxiety of the spectators'
william mortensen 'thoughts and emotions can't be photographed' p24
Emotions aren't captured in the photograph, but are invoked by the photograph to be reproduced by the seer.
Thomas Ruff 'most photo's we come across today aren't really authentic anymore'
'they have the authenticity of a manipulated and prearranged reality
The photographers in this book are confronting that Warholian nihilismm workig their way through it, and helping in myriad creative ways to restore some of the old magic to the mirror. p25
GAZES facing up/facing down
expressions, up to difficult situations, face down adversaries, applied to photography
power not always in the hands of the photographer, sometimes it's a 'faceoff'
Rineke Dijkstra - Tia, Amsterdam June 23 1994
Mother 3 weeks and 6months after birth
dual portrayal seems more truthful 'tyranny of an instant'
one way mirror of the photograph gives us liscence to stare
Nicholas Nixon, aren't we a little alarmed by the proximity, three a crowd?
Andree Chaluleau - series L'enveners du miroir
portraits in a mirror, all differe t
LEE FRIEDLANDER oaxaca, mexico 1995 + anza-borrego state park, california 1997
'self-portraits of photographers are usually arrogant affairs, representations of confident, prescient artists, often seen seamlessly wedded to their mechanical 'eye'. Rare indeed is the self-portrait in which the photographer admits to a decline in his powers with age, or lays bare his fatigue with the world. Here, however Lee Friedlander faces up to his imminent demise, a weary soul resigned to a slow dissolution back into nature'
Unflattering, perhaps has more meaning and significance than mine, mine is in a period of manipulation, power and that relfects my age.
Jorge Molder - series T.V 1996 extreme up close self-portraits
seen as 'too real, too truthful'
I feel photography has become too lost, and involved in processes that the magic is slowly fading away
LOOKS masks/mergers
un self-portrait Gillian Wearing
Rafael Goldchain, self portraits, inserted himself into his family history
No portrait is ever really taken, rather made
Is Cindy Shermans portraits as opposed to self-portraits because they do not represent herself do they... what If I put on an elephant costume inside a box it is no longer a self portrait of myself is it? most of the light reaching the camera dfoesn't come from myself does it!?
FACADES losing face/saving face
meaning a deceptive outward appearance
'can any photograph of a face taken in a fraction os a second do justice to the complexity of that human being?'
painting with a long exposure...
TRANSPLANTS faking faces/making faces
don't usually say 'this is a photograph of my son, we say 'this is my son
none of us complain when we end up looking better in a photograph, but grumble when we look worse
Martin Parr's autoportraits p201
Yotta Kippe fabricated self-portraits 'precious moments'
"What is the function of a portrait? What degree of manipulation is correct, acceptable, between the sitter and the photographer, and should art concern itself with accuracy? Shouldn't photography worry about that even more?
R. Avedon 1993
claus goedicke all untitled 2000 wonders how we free ourselves from socual stereotyping and psychological analysis
Lucas samaras extraordinary self-portraits
photo transformation
Simon Johnson
www.thephilosophicalphotographer.co.uk
FACE - william A. Ewing
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