Inspiration

Today I thought I'd share some of my inspiration for the upcoming project with you. 

To be honest, I have no clue what I want to do my photography project about and I'm slowly starting to panic because I feel like everybody has already got their topic and I'm still drowning in a pool of ideas. 

I actually got a lot of different ideas how my project could look like or which topics it could touch upon. But although I have so many different themes in my head, I don't really know how I could work out a whole photography project with any of them. 

However, as you will see, I'm extremely inspired by portraits. Especially portraits that show people with different cultural backgrounds, disabilities or in various living conditions. 

For me, photographs and especially portraits tell stories. Looking into the eyes of someone else can sometimes tell you so much more then any bestseller novel could. 

Additionally, I think that photography is also one of the greatest tools to shock, raise awareness and criticize something. 

To illustrate what exactly I mean by this, I'm now going to show you some photographs that touched, inspired and fascinated me for various reasons and some of them are thus maybe also potential inspirations for my photography project for this term.

SUR-FAKE

(Photo credits: Antoine Geiger) 

« Mankind, which in Homer’s time was an object of contemplation for the Olympian gods, is now one for itself. Its self-alienation has reached such a degree that it can experience its own destruction as aesthetic pleasure of the first order. » 

''It is placing the screen as an object of "mass subculture", alienating the relation to our own body, and more generally to the physical world.''

(http://antoinegeiger.com/filter/photo/SUR-FAKE)

As I'm studying Media&Communications, this project really fascinated me, because it is extremely accurate and contemporary. 

In my course, I constantly get confronted to the ubiquitous role that modern technologies play in most people's lives and to the way in which they change us and influence our behavior, as well as our interpersonal communication and our daily life. 

Antoine Geiger criticizes the omnipresence of phones and other technological devices in our daily life, in a way that is understandable for everybody and yet has a kind of shocking effect because of the deformed faces. 

Forgotten Souls

(Photo Credits: Victor Chirkin)

“My vision for my pho­tog­ra­phy is one of ser­vice in the tra­di­tion  of James Nachtwey and Lisa Kris­tine.  Their focus has been more global, bring­ing atten­tion to injus­tices around the world.  My mis­sion is to make a dif­fer­ence in my own backyard” (Victor Chirkin)

“My intent is to bring hope, dig­nity, atten­tion and an iden­tity to the For­got­ten “Souls” that live their lives in obscu­rity, in the shad­ows and on the fringe of our com­mu­ni­ties.  My hope is that my work pro­motes under­stand­ing, evokes a sense of human­ity, inspires com­pas­sion and a desire to act.” (Victor Chirkin)
 (http://www.soulsnotforgotten.com/about/)

On his blog, Victor Chirkin has a huge gallery of portraits and photographs of homeless people, and all of them capture the reality and the miserable conditions in which these people have to live.       This work is so inspirational because it just shows that photography doesn't always have to be about happy faces and lovely sunsets. A photograph can also show misery, poverty and sadness and still be inspirational and fascinating, because it gives the viewer an exclusive insight into all this misery and sadness and this insight may touch people and may open their eyes to the reality that some people live in.                                                                                                                                                       I also think that, especially the fact that all of Chirkin's pictures are in black and white makes the photographs even more powerful and emphasizes the message, which is to raise awareness of the lives of those that are less fortunate than most people are.

The Changing Face of America

(Photo Credits: Martin Schoeller)

''I like building catalogs of faces that invite people to share them.  I want to challenge the way we use appearance to challenge identity.'' (Martin Schoeller)

(http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2013/10/changing-faces/funderburg-text)

''A feature in National Geographic‘s October 125th anniversary issue looks at the changing face of America in an article by Lise Funderburg, with portraits of multiracial families by Martin Schoeller, that celebrates the beauty of multiracial diversity and shows the limitations around our current categories when talking about race'' (http://proof.nationalgeographic.com/2013/09/17/visualizing-change/)

Some people may say that this isn't really extraordinary or special photography, because these are actually 'only' portraits. BUT I think that the message that all of these portraits convey is so powerful. For me, this shows that sometimes aesthetics only play a minor role in photography, especially when there is a special message in the picture. 

The fact that I live on such a multicultural campus has really opened my eyes towards nationalities, identity and race and therefore I think that this could maybe be a really strong inspiration for my project because I could imagine to try and focus my project around different cultures and nationalities as well.

The Tutu Project

(Photo Credits: Bob Carey)

''The Tutu Project™ began in 2003 as a lark. I mean, really, think of it. Me photographing myself in a pink tutu, how crazy is that? But eleven years ago my wife, Linda, and I moved to the East Coast and, as odd as it may sound it, the self-portraits proved to be a perfect way of expressing myself. Why? Because even though the move was exciting, exhilarating, and inspiring, it was 180 degrees from what I knew. So I took the old, mixed it in with the new, and kept the tutu handy.  Six months after the move, Linda, was diagnosed with breast cancer. She beat it, only to have it recur in 2006. During these past ten years, I’ve been in awe of her power, her beauty, and her spirit. Oddly enough, her cancer has taught us that life is good, dealing with it can be hard, and sometimes the very best thing—no, the only thing—we can do to face another day is to laugh at ourselves, and share a laugh with others.'' (Bob Carey)

(http://thetutuproject.com/about/)

This is probably the most emotional of all my inspirations. Again this picture isn't so much about aesthetics but rather about the message and the story behind the man in the pink tutu. 

Cancer has become such a widespread disease nowadays, and most people have already been confronted with it, either by becoming sick themselves or by seeing a loved one suffer and I think that with his tutu Bob Carey shows that there are different ways to deal with such a horrible diagnosis.

The Faceboard Project

(Photo Credit: Mike Larremore)

''Denver-based portrait photographer Mike Larremore's photo series Faceboard Project showcases an amazing range of human emotions. Each image is made up of 16 individual photographs that show the subject in the center of the frame, face contorted in a variety of facial expressions.

The photographer's decision to focus on just the subject's face, with no props or clothing to distract the viewer, strips each person down to the bare essentials: the human face and the different emotions it can convey. From anger and fear to amusement and happiness, Larremore's photos capture the spirit of all the ups and downs that are a part of being human.''                                    (http://www.mymodernmet.com/profiles/blogs/mike-larremore-faceboard-project)

Larremore's Faceboard Project was definitely not the first thing that came into my mind when I thought about inspiration and ideas for my photography project. In general, I just love natural portraits, because I think that they depict reality the best and as I am also a big fan of german literature, a very famous text from a german author, called Rainer Maria Rilke, initially served me as an inspiration.  In his text, Rilke talks about faces, and about how every person has different faces, that are like masks that we put on for certain occasions or in the presence of certain people. I don't know why, but as I thought of ideas for my project, that text immediately appeared in my head. So I thought how I could visually show how people have different personalities and faces and as I was scrolling through Google, I found this amazing project by Larremore. I just love how one person can have so many different sides and personalities. Often people are judged normal or boring because of their clothes and their appearance, but a project like this shows that the interesting parts, the different sides of a person, are on the inside. I would love to do my photography project about a similar topic, but in contrast to Larremore's portraits I would want to have the photographs in black and white because I think that that puts the focus even more on the actual face and its different expressions without having a background that might distract the viewer.