When thinking about my personal childhood and memories, I became attatched to certain things such as personal toys and teddys. The beauty of children is the way there imagination can turn any object into something so different and how a simple toy can become something so real and with it's own story. A teddy bear is an obvious representation of children so i decided to experiment with that idea:
I did a simple experiment with my camera and a teddy bear, I've tried to show how a simple object can be manipulated by the surroundings, lighting and angle. The first photo is a simple shot, brightly lit with vibrant surroundings. The teddy is therefore veiwed as it was intended to be, a fun cuddly toy used by children in a bedroom. However, when the settings taken away, the lightings more harsh and a visual hierarchy is obvious like in the second photograph, the teddy bear takes on a different persona and the perspective is completely different.
Obviously this was only a quick experiment but it's basically some simple trial and error to try and work out how my still-life's eventually going to look. My idea is basically to create a still life of childrens toys yet to manipulate that with the lighting and angle to create a deeper more frightening veiw on the objects.
Hi Alex,
ReplyDeleteThis may be good news or bad news but your blog is the first one I've posted a comment on and I'm feeling quite nervous so please forgive me if I put my foot in the wrong place. I've got a few questions which I'll fire at you, they may be irrelevant. An interesting experiment to make a point - I'm wondering if you've done any further experiments? Have you tried a range of teddy bears or other toys? Have you researched how the toy has been represented in different media such as advertising, picture books, comics etc. Can a toy show pain, can it look evil? On that latter question I'm thinking that we were all children once and some of us who were victims grow into abusers and so the cycle continues. Your friend who was abused - that seems a very sensible starting point - have you written about that person's experience, trying to put your yourself in that situation, as a means to make your imagination work? And how about writing from the viewpoint of the abuser - how does that feel? Let me know if you think these questions are any good - if not tell me why. Hope this helps. Best wishes, Chris