The Brief
Professional
Practice – Semester 1
Attempting
and Refining New Practices
This module
is delivered in two parts.
Part
1
Practitioner
Study
Using
guidance and material from lecture and seminar programme, develop a blog
investigation into a range of creative practitioners that you are
initially unfamiliar with. Develop this as a ‘branched’ investigation with
images, biographies and image evaluations. Discuss the functionality and
usage of their work, and comment upon work that defines a new or changing
role for photography in relation to other visual media.
Part
2
Practical
Investigation
Identify
processes, techniques or modes of working that are new to you and work on
imagery production that develops, refines and combines these practices.
Work
towards a professional quality portfolio of images that combines evidence of
study and practice from both Parts ready for critique seminar at the end of the
Semester.
Present – A range of
professional prints in Seminar, not necessarily mounted along with
your blog link.
Deadline – January Seminar 1
assessment week, date to be advised.
THE IDEA
I like the
notion of developing my work in the area of Macro Photography, but how to
choose a subject. Some years ago I supported a teenage girl who was
experiencing difficulty in accepting physical contact. She had been
sexually abused by her father's childhood friend (they met on their first day
at school when they were 5 years old). She had been emotionally
blackmailed by her abuser/babysitter from the age of nine until she reached
puberty at thirteen when she finally disclosed the sexual abuse, which she
believed was her fault. This man had damaged
her cognitive functioning around her sexuality, as well as her body
concept, sense of autonomy, self esteem and any ability to develop physical
relationship with others of her choice. He had told her that the only
people who would want her were "dirty old men". These are the
common practices of sexual predators of young girls. The paedophile was
convicted and imprisoned, but the family moved hundreds of miles away from
their home in the hope of a new start.
The girl at
fifteen had a boyfriend who wanted to have a physical relationship with her,
but she could hardly bear his touch. She hated her body and did not want
anyone to touch her, even her close family. She knew she felt very
differently from her peers, and could not see a way forward.
In order to
help her I took a Solution Focused Approach, and tried to change the way she
saw her body. Assuring her of the beauty of the human body and hers in
particular I suggested that in private she examine closely and touch different
parts of her body, e.g. the skin and hair on her arms, her hands and all
joints, her hair, then legs, finger and toe nails, eyelashes, etc. Later
I suggested she look carefully at her different parts of her face, particularly
her eyes and her mouth (open and closed) then her tongue and teeth. She
did this and we worked on this for weeks, with her reporting what she had
discovered about her own body each week. Later she examined larger parts
of her body from all angles, including her breasts. This was done in a
very controlled way - her own control, which helped give a sense of
self-direction and made her reconsider how she saw her body.
In a
Cognitive Approach we also discussed how she saw her abuser and what she saw as
her responsibility in the abuse, and gradually her perception of his actions
changed, and her guilt reduced. She was able to look at her body in a
different and more positive way and to gain some autonomy.
What I
would like to do in this project is to be able to take very beautiful marco
images of parts of the body in her honour. Many young people who have
suffered similar sexual abuse have the same abhorrence of their
bodies and I would like to be able to show them how beautiful a human
body is. This project might form part of a therapy for those who work with
children and young people who have been abused, and who have a negative view of
their body (or who have body dysmorphia for other reasons) and this would be a
new or changing role of photography.
TUTORIAL
WITH RP
Richard was
very helpful in helping me to take my idea forward, suggesting that I consider
photographers of macro images and research how to light macro images.
Richard advised me that a small sensor SLR camera would achieve a smaller
object than a full 35mm sensor SLR camera, and suggested the college has a
Canon 60 mm Macro lens, although I have a Tamron 90mm macro lens which I
think will give me a large/closer object image as the greater the focal length
the larger the subject appears in the image.
Richard
suggested I research the work of Jo Spence.
More
importantly he suggested that I could produce "Body Landscapes" that
were almost abstract so the images could be both beautiful and
interesting. This will be a challenging project for me.
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