In the first week of Creative Media Production, we are doing an object lesson. This is our first project for assessment and is a one week project. I have chosen for my object a postcard called 'From Pretty Woman, Tokyo, 2017 by Daido Moriyama.
Neoteric Photography
Neoteric Photography aims to explore photography in an age where the image is everywhere. The image has become prolific yet easily forgotten. Hoping to find something to hold onto, something that will survive longer that it takes for pixels to appear upon a screen.
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Tuesday, 1 April 2025
Creative Media: Object Lesson
Saturday, 29 March 2025
Welcome to Summer Term 2025
As one term ends, another begins and there is so little time to reflect! So I will dive right in and discuss what I have been looking at over the 'break'. I was searching Carl Laszlo, one of my favourite art collectors and artists. Laszlo discovered and promoted amazing, unusual and daring artists and was the founder of Panderma a publication celebrating neo dada and outsider art. I found a book from a Panderma edition called 'Mondgeistfahrt' (Moon Ghost Trip) by Friedrich Schröder Sonnenstern. I now have it sitting right by me on my desk, a strange beautiful thing by a truly eccentric man!.
Sonnerstern's works contained motifs and repeated symbols, and as time went on, many related to the moon and had moon in the title. Karlins states, 'His drawings are loaded with unsettling sexual, religious and scatological imagery, yet their plush colors and beautiful palette are impressively seductive.' (Karlins, 2024) Many of his works are made with coloured pencils and there is a naive quality underlying quite complex symbology. The image above with the snake essentially eatings its tail with the woman's breasts being bitten does remind the viewer of the Tarot Card, The World, where everything ends and begins again. The woman here, again is strangely distorted with breasts for a chin and strange ducklike feet. In the book for this image, the text states; 'I simply can't put enough round shapes into my pictures - no sharp corners, for they would represent life itself. All round forms are tokens of Perception.', (Schroder-Sonnenstern, 1974:20).
References
Karlins, N.F. (2024). Outsider Artist Friedrich Schr�der-Sonnenstern at Michael Werner Gallery - artnet Magazine. [online] Artnet.com. Available at: http://www.artnet.com/magazineus/features/karlins/schroeder-sonnenstern-michael-werner4-14-11.asp [Accessed 29 Mar. 2025].
Michaelwerner.com. (2020). FRIEDRICH SCHRÖDER-SONNENSTERN - From Barefoot Prophet to Avant-Garde Artist - Exhibitions - Michael Werner Gallery, New York, London, Beverly Hills, Athens. [online] Available at: https://www.michaelwerner.com/exhibitions/friedrich-schroder-sonnenstern [Accessed 29 Mar. 2025].
Pendle, G. (2025). Friedrich Schröder-Sonnenstern. [online] Frieze.com. Available at: https://www.frieze.com/article/friedrich-schr%C3%B6der-sonnenstern [Accessed 29 Mar. 2025].
Schroder-Sonnenstern, F. (1974). Mongeistfahrt. First ed. Munchen, Germany: Verlag F.Bruckmann KG.
Swislow, B. (2012). Book Review: Friedrich Schröder-Sonnenstern - Interesting Ideas. [online] Interestingideas.com. Available at: https://www.interestingideas.com/book-review-friedrich-schroder-sonnenstern/ [Accessed 29 Mar. 2025].
Creative Media Production: Reflection
This term we began with the Object Lesson which was about exploring an idea and maybe trying something outside our usual comfort zone. My object was a postcard by Adam Broomberg and Oliver Chanarin (2012) called Alias which was like a negative with a red filter. I was quite excited about this project as I had the idea of drawing with photographs and ended up making a reverse drawing photographically of myself and my son when he was small. I call this 'Mother and Child' (circa 2006) as that is when the original photograph was taken. This was a short project (just a week) but it was good to do something really different using different processes and materials.
The second project was a photographic portrait project. We had practised in class natural light and studio portraits and studied text about portrait photography, the text we studied was from 'Photography' by John Ingledew (Second Edition 2013). We looked at the portraits/self-portraits chapter. I very much enjoyed exploring the Helmut Newton image; "Self portrait with Model in the Hotel Bijou", Paris, 1971. My own project was inspired by the images of Sunil Gupta's 'From Here to Eternity' (1995), I really was taken by these images as it was illness from HIV and clubs he used to visit (which look in the images abandoned or closed down).
My idea was to create a similar concept, so I photographed doors that meant something to me, and these were to be paired with self-portaits. Normally, I might share stories about these but there are multiple meanings to me, and like Gupta I want to keep these stories private. The diptychs are for the viewer to connect, make meaning.
These images if I had more time, I would have taken the actions again as I thought they could be improved. The doors were exactly as I had wanted. The concept works for me and I was personally very happy with the concept outcomes.
The final project was the chapbook, and I had more trouble with this than any other book I had created. I started with an idea which I quite liked about an old man with a secret from the cold war and the I liked the writing of the first chapter but after this I felt that I was not getting the chapters right, the second chapter I actually dropped entirely and changed the third chapter to the second chapter then wrote another third chapter. After all this, I was still unhappy with the outcome. I felt the story did not flow as it should and that I should have started with the woman in Canada as this, I felt was far stronger than from the viewpoint of the old man.
I don't want to end on a negative, as I have learnt more from this than anything I felt was good. In my reflection on Digital Arts project I was very positive about these. For Creative Media this term I lacked something and it did not come together, next term I will be working much harder on a tighter theme and spending much more time testing and planning.
Friday, 7 March 2025
Digital Arts: Reflection
This is my final post for Digital Arts Spring Term. In this post, I will reflect on the work I have done and on my website design. I began this term by creating sequential images, I created a class practice of 'What's in my bag?' and then for the final images I created 'Bonkers Bauhaus' For this project I made a sock monkey, which actually took several hours over one evening as this is handsewn. He was supposed to reflect Dada/Bauhaus art and design and I do like him as he is the maddest monkey I have made and really does reflect the Dada images from the 1920s/30s. If I had a mass of time I think I would like to make something like this on a massive scale as he would make a great work of art.
My next project was to create an advertisement, I decided to create an advertisement for a bank, I have never done this before so I found this highly enjoyable. I checked out funny bank adverts and really the sort of advert that would sell to Generation X. What I liked about this advert was the logo which I thought was quite on trend, a bit like Monzo Bank. I also liked the name as Plutus is the God of Wealth and I really loved researching this, I found out so much more about bank adverts and who they are targeting and I found out about banking in Switzerland. I liked the tagline as it was specifically for Gen x/Baby Boomers - we have already done the hard work and we should be able to relax! I like it also that is the safest bank in the world, since I made this advert the world has become even more uncertain with the rise of Trump and his directives, the economy will certainly be affected and we should be working on saving ourselves from the possible risks of the future. Overall this is one of the best adverts I have made and most enjoyable!
My major project this term was 'A Response to the Trump Inauguration' when I began I was thinking of Marina Abramovic screaming, 'AAA-AAA' (1978) as all I wanted to do was scream in despair When I started this project Trump had just been inaugurated since then it has got so much worse and my film used a combination of stock footage and my own film and used captions to highlight the issues, I also used music that reminded on the Bonzo Dog Doo Da band so it had the required absurdity of the situation. I enjoyed making this and it was a reminder that we should all speak up and stand up for the things in the world we believe to be wrong. I can't change the situation but voices will rise and I am hoping that Europe will stand up to Putin, to Trump and we will be strong in the face of aggression. Technically I quite enjoyed the domestic screaming in the filming with more time it could have been slicker and more polished however I don't think I really wanted that, I wanted it to be more like a piece of performance art of the 1960s/70s on stage like Ono's 'Cut Piece' (1964)
Thursday, 6 March 2025
Digital Arts: UX Testing & Feedback
I have now tested my website by using UX testing, this is testing the user experience of my website. Over the term I have created a user interface (front-end) design. Therefore I created google form which I embedded into my website. I then made site live and shared my website address wiyth my class so that they could test my site and give feedback so that I could improve and fix any ussues before assessment.
Here is my UX testing statistics and feedback
On my UX testing I only got four responses however any feedback is useful. In this one person only thought the design was 'fair' so my site did not really appeal to that person. My site will not appeal to everyone as not everyone is interested in photography/performance/film so I think as the majority stated that it was 'good' or 'excellent' I am happy with my homepage and I do think I will keep this as it is for the moment.
My about page was not as well received as again I got 'fair', I clearly do not appeal to that person and perhaps the work I do is of no interest to them. The rest of the responses were 'good and 'excellent' so I think in this case I will be keeping this as it is for the moment.
On the contact page it was all 'good' or 'excellent' so this is clearly working well and serves it purpose with a good design.
I was not expecting everyone to love my Trump film, I created it as I had to respond to the political situation it was an imperitive however I know that not everyone will agree and will not like my response and in fact if someone really hates my film that means that it has done its job - it would be so much worse if I had just had apathy!
I think that perhaps smaller is better so that was useful feedback and thank you to everyone who completed this for me!
Sunday, 2 March 2025
Finalising Photography and Presentation
My final post on finalising my work for Creative Media, in this post I will just put together the images I have shot inspired by Sunil Gupta's 'From Here to Eternity' (2020) where he had juxtaposed images of places with his treatment for illness with HIV and his life in his home.
Photography Project Process: Actions
The first half of this project was static with the doors where I waited patiently for the sun. This second half are the actions that go with this, to achieve the original concept.
Here I set my DSLR camera on a tripod and unfortunately, I had left my remote at work so it had to be just using 2 and 10 second self timer which was more time-consuming and a little more restrictive. The camera was set on 200 ISO as in most of my flat the light was good due to the sun and I have a wide open aperture F4 to begin. All images were in black and white and portrait.
I chose my Sunday morning actions as these are rituals and I stick to these religiously as one should on a Sunday!
I created the contact sheets in Photoshop and I just needed then to think about how I would place my images together.