This project focuses on the theme ‘Human: Nature’. This theme can be interpreted in many ways. For instance, it can address the universal concerns faced by the world. The duality in the theme can be freely interpreted either as ‘Human Nature’ or ‘Human & Nature’. The ‘colon’ represents a relationship and a balanced ratio between Human and Nature.
This project takes the form of a photo essay comprising of six to ten photos in the context of conceptual photography. A photo essay is a set or series of photographs that are intended to tell either, a concept, an idea, a story or evoke a series of emotions in the viewer. This essay can be sequential in nature, intended to be viewed in a particular order, or they may consist of non-order photographs, which may be viewed all at once or in an order chosen by the viewer.
Based on these requirements, I have decided to start my project by forming a personal interpretation on the theme, ‘Human: Nature’. I have interpreted the theme in three ways—how human affects nature, how nature affects human and human nature (as in the character and personality of mankind). Based on these three interpretations, I started brainstorming for ideas and inspiration based on the lecture notes, 2902 gallery field trip, library books and the images on the Internet.
Brainstorming
After visiting the 2902 gallery, I also dropped by the Osage gallery, where I came across a book by Jane Lee illustrating the different traditional ethnic Chinese costumes and people placed in an illogical manner forming various art pieces to show the concept of wisdom. These pictures guide me along the notion of ‘human nature’ and encouraged me to think deeper on the portrayal of traditional costumes and customs to illustrate ‘human nature’. Besides this, with reference to photographer, Yeondoo Jung’s work on ‘Bewitched’, which shows a series of photographs of different people with their ambition closely related to their posture in the photos, inspired me to combine these concepts together to form a photo essay. After thinking deeper, I came up with my first idea. The images (shown on the next page), which may not reflect the exact intended angles, are acquired from the Internet as reference. These images portrayed my idea on respect. They may be viewed in the order—from left to right.
In this series of photos, I am illustrating the concept of respect—how humans will treat others based on traditional customs and beliefs, which shapes their character and personality. It is also part of human nature that man expects different forms of respect based on their own cultural norms and customs. Ideally, these photos should be showing three individuals and a monk displaying the same posture from left to right, showing the different forms of respect. These photos also show that man respects their fellow counterparts as much as the way they respect god, who built Mother Nature for us.
As I do not have the resources to execute the above idea, I pondered for another idea. I was browsing through the library shelves on conceptual photography and chanced upon Cindy Sherman work on ‘Working Girl, Decade Series 2005’. In her work, she is using conceptual photography to portray women in different scenarios. The following series of images on the next page attracted me and I was inspired to do a photo essay on the process of a woman putting on make-up and dressing up for her job.
These photos show that it is part of human nature for mankind to look good and pleasing to others. Although a woman model is the sole subject in these photos, they illustrate the desire of humans to look beautiful in front of others.
As the above idea shows only one aspect of human nature and I could not add value to that idea, I moved on in search for another idea. While flipping through some library books on conceptual photography, I saw many of them focusing on food and they look extremely appetizing. After looking through all the photos on food, I decided that I should focus my project on a certain type of food and illustrate how human affects nature. Initially, I narrowed down my selection of food to fruits. My aim is to show how a small variety of fruits can be processed into different food and beverage for human consumption. The six photos, which are taken from the Internet as reference, are shown on the next page and they must be viewed form left to right.
Idea Development
After considering the above ideas and concepts seriously, I decided to focus my project on fruits and show how human affects nature by processing fruits (food from nature) into more delectable food for human consumption. I felt that by focusing on three fruits may be quite a handful and the above idea on fruits being processed into food for human consumption has a weak focus (too many fruits involved) and a weak theme (no commonality).
On further thoughts, the idea of strawberries struck me as an ideal subject. Firstly, strawberries are red and attractive. Hence, they look good in photos. Secondly, strawberries can be processed into many types of food. After pondering over some of food produced from strawberries, I decided to focus on theme—delectable strawberry desserts. The following photos were gathered from the Internet for reference. These photos can be viewed in any manner.
After refering to some photographers' works and the images on the Internet, I have noticed that most of them used high key photos to bring out the mood of delectable and appetizing food. Hence, I have taken some photos on my own.
During my consultation with my tutor, Ms Chiang on the photos, she suggested that I explore another execution style such as an exotic full course meal made of strawberries. After thinking through this idea and discussing it critically with my course mates, I have decided to undertake this approach. I began to search for a full course meal with strawberries as their ingredients in every dish. I tried to look for food made of strawberries that either no one had heard of, thought of or eaten before. I managed to come up with a full strawberry course meal, comprising of six dishes, starting with strawberry salad, strawberry soup, strawberry fried rice, strawberry soda drink, strawberry biscuit dessert, strawberries as fruits. The final photos of my artwork are as follows:
These six photos show how humans use strawberries to make a full course delectable meal specially to appeal to mankind for consumption.
Failed Attempts
I have faced difficulties searching for a suitable and potential subject for this project. After sieving through all the ideas and concepts, I have finally managed to narrow down to a full course meal featuring my subject—the strawberries.
Another problem surfaced when most strawberries’ food products are common and recognizable by everyone. My challenge was to hunt for exotic strawberry food that was unheard of, but look appetizing to humans. Luckily, with the aid of the Internet, I found many unusual recipes on strawberry food.
In terms of photography technicalities, I tend to produce blur photos due to the shake of the camera when I am capturing the scene. To overcome this problem, I used the aid of a tripod to take my photos.
Besides that, my photography skills are far from polished, which results in my weak presentation of the series of high key photos (on the first attempt of strawberry full course meal) that does not seem to create an appetizing mood for potential consumers. With the help of the photo editing software, Photoshop, I managed to edit my photos to enhance their appearance. Hopefully, they look more appetizing and appealing after the photo edit process.
I also faced problems with printing my photos. When I was all ready to print at the CNM teaching lab, the Espon printer refused to work. It started flashing red light signals and no matter what Jennifer and I did, it still refused to work. Jennifer called up the Espon help desk for aid. After following all the instructions from the helpdesk officer, it still refused to work. The officer deduced that it could be a hardware problem and will arrange with Jennifer to send their technician to the CNM lab to diagnose the problem. After the call, Jennifer and I was wondering if there was anything stuck in the printer as suggested by the helpdesk officer. We turned the printer upside down to make sure that there was indeed nothing inside the printer. Then, Jennifer took out the ink cartridges and placed them back again and what happened next was amazing. The printer managed to work again! I can finally start printing my work.
After printing my art work, I realised that certain photos do not look white enough for instance the photo on the strawberry biscuit desert and the strawberry as fruits. I re-edited my photo using Photoshop by painting the background white with a white brush. After the enhancement, I printed those two photos again.
Reflection
Upon reflection, I think if I were given more time, I may have pursued a full course strawberry meal based on the context of different ethnicity. For instance, I may focus solely on Chinese wedding dinner ten course meal made of strawberry
On the other hand, it would be even more interesting to show the highlights of different ethnic culture’s cuisines made from strawberry. For example, we could have strawberry curry (Malay food), strawberry roti prata (Indian food), strawberry chicken rice (Chinese food), etc.
Another idea of going global would be having popular international cuisines integrating strawberry into their menu. For instance, we could have strawberry sushi, strawberry soba or strawberry ramen in Japan. These examples may be more out of the ordinary and may attract more attention than the current one.
The above mentioned examples will also add more excitement due to the infusion of strawberry and also add more colour into my series of photographs, such as the cultural aspects of each country or ethnic group.
Besides this, I have also learnt that it is crucial to manage my time properly and finish my work on schedule, such as at least two weeks before the dateline so that I have enough time to photo edit and print my artwork. Since unanticipated situations may always crop up, having enough time to solve the problem is vital in meeting the dateline.
References
Google Images (2009). Retrieved on November 3, 2009 from: http://images.google.com.sg/images?rlz=1T4SUNA_enSG297SG298&hl=en&source=hp&q=strawberry&gbv=2&aq=f
Cindy.S.(2005). Working Girl Decade Series 2005. Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis
