The Body

Initial Ideas


This unit, The Body, aims to explore the representation of the human body, specifically at portraits.
Answering first of course, what  is a portrait? A portrait can be made in many ways, both abstract and simplistic, but, fundamentally it must represent a likeness to the person or subject, be it a visually simplistic likeness to facial features, or if it delves deeper into portraying this persons inner person.
A portrait is not just a simplistic recording of a persons appearance, as it uses much of the same principles of still life, the same use of semiotics can be applied to the portrait to tell a deeper and more complex story of the subject.
This can complicate portraits even further, as it then means that the likeness to the subject does not necessarily have to be through the subjects physical appearance, the subject can be visually obscure and their likeness be told through the mise en scene depending of course on the personality of the subject and the intentions of the photographer.


For this unit our subject must be unknown to us, which leaves the portrait incredibly open and potentially difficult to us.
For my model I will be using a musician from the Medway area named Liam Lynott. He is a local Blues Guitarist, who works both solo and with a band named Broken Banjo. I have come to chosing him as my model, as he often plays at local pubs I frequent, and whenever he has played, he has always had bands lined up around him that are completely contrasting in musical style. I get the impression of a man born in the wrong era, as the bands he is surrounded by are quite simplistic and best summarised as 'pop culture', yet frequently this young blues guitarist will get up on stage and play his blues. I almost view it in a sense of purity, it is simplistic in action, to simply get on stage and play, without care for the crowd or from judgement, he is simply a musician, and a musician plays music. This is a concept I would like to explore with my portrait of this musician.

The Motorcycle Diaries


This idea of showing him in simplistic honesty, came entirely from The Motorcycle Diaries, which is a film by Walter Salles based on the journals of Alberto Granado and Ernesto Guevara, Ernesto Guevara would later become known as the revolutionist Che Guevara.
The reason this film has inspired my idea and visual style so much, is that this film is based on a journey Ernesto Guevara took before he became part of the Cuban Revolution, however it is what drove him to revolution. The idea of his journey was simply that of adventure that he shared with his friend Alberto, they wanted to explore their land, and along their travels they agreed to stop at certain areas dealing with leprosy as they where both medical students specialised in this field.
This almost 'teenage dream of adventure' turns into almost a pilgrimage, as he explores Latin America and sees poverty and injustice where ever he travels, his eyes are opened. Throughout the film there are scenes that contain 'moving stills' where they portrait the people he meets, and shows them in honesty and simplicity.

We see these people in snapshots of their life, they presented as though there is not a camera, they simply turn and seem to almost bare their soul, if the camera continued you could almost imagine them turning back to their task and to have the world suddenly snap back to life, as though there never was that pause.
It is this idea of simplicity and honesty that I wish to capture.

Arnold Newman


I was first put on to Arnold Newman when I saw his portrait of Stravinsky hanging on an office wall in the photography department.

Igor Stravinsky was a composer, pianist and conductor, and widely acknowledged as on of the most important and influential composers of the 20th century. His compositional career was notable for its stylistic diversity, he was commissioned by the Impresario Sergei Diaghilev (performed by the Russian Ballet), these where The Firebird, Petrushka and The Rite of Spring. The Rite whose premiere provoked a riot, transformed the way in which subsequent composers thought about rhythmic structure.

As his musical style was so different it has often been said that he revolutionised music and really pushed the boundaries of musical design. This all started around 1910 along with a new wave of art form as well like the birth of cubism, and slightly later on coinciding with surrealism, and Stravinsky himself was once painted by Picasso.
From a mere glance at this photo if you are even vaguely familiar with the works of Picasso (as most are) you can identify that this man whether you know him or not was part of that art movement, and this is simply from the way we see the background and the piano, as the background is not quite natural, it is two different colours, one a very light grey, the other quite dark, but the colours are so solid, and not equal in proportions either that they are obviously not a natural backdrop, the piano becomes part of this as well, as it is more or less a complete silhouette, so we see the light shade, middle shade, and the the piano is the dark shade, so we see a colour spectrum almost from white to black with these three colours. With the angle of the piano as well, if you remove Stravinsky from the photograph, it could blend in perfectly with cubist paintings, and the piano is no longer a piano, it is only recognisable as an abstract shape. This technique is incredibly as it makes us lose our sense of depth and perspective, and the piano merges with the backdrop, but with the presence of Stravinsky leaning on it, we suddenly identify it as a piano, so we know it is a physical object, but it does not appear as such. This loss of depth makes the portrait completely part of that new wave movement of cubism and surrealism, particularly as the abstract shapes take up the majority of the frame, we identify Stravinsky as completely immersed in this style, this alternate world.

This incredible use of the props and the backdrop has expanded my thought process far more about how to show the musical and artist style of my subject.

After seeing this portrait on the wall, I decided to get out his book for inspiration and it was opened with a foreward by John Hayes (Director of the National Portrait Gallery) who said:

Of all forms of art, portraiture is one of the most elusive, and one of the most difficult for any artist effectively to master. This may well sound a paradoxical thing to say in view of the number of artists who practise it. But I think they would agree with me. It is partly that the human face, though of compelling interest to every one of us, remains the most mysterious of all subjects; and partly that, once an artist has achieved a likeness which he thinks credible, the pictorial means at his disposal - design, colour, line, associations - for amplifying that likeness, for defining the individuality of posture, gestures, movement, above all for revealing personality, are severely contained.


This quote I believe quite poignantly summarised the portrait, and the problems one is faced when creating one, as we have many tools at our disposal to enhance this personality, much like the abstract shapes and piano in Newman's Stravinsky, but in creating the photograph you are still squashing something 2 dimensional, and how do we present this 2 dimensional person? For if too much direction is given doesn't that mean that you have forced and constructed what you see of that person, doesn't that make the portrait not a portrait, but instead your own interpretation? Which means you lose truth in the image; there is a quote about individuality from a Japanese Anime known as Neon Genesis Evangelion written by Hideaki Anno, which is that "Every self is composed of two selves, the self which is observed, and the self which observes itself, there is the you in your mind, and the you in the minds of others" and I find myself referring back to this quote again again, and it summarises quite well the issue one is faced with when taking a portrait, do you portrait the them that you see? or will you try to find a way to see the them they see?
Arnold Newman has written himself, that he is 'convinced that any photographic attempt to show the complete  man is nonsense, to an extent. We can only show, as best we can, what the outer man reveals.'

Philip Lorca Dicorcia


Phillip Lorca Dicorcia combines two very different principles in style for his photography, combining the documentary snapshot styling with theatrical lighting like you would expect to see in cinema or advertising creating very powerful portraits.

  He wanted to capture people in their complete natural state, but he also has this idea of drawing emphasis and drama towards them which is a very hard concept to achieve. He began by using family and friends to every day things but in a constructed and controlled environment, but finding these too forced and set up he began a far more difficult task of hiding lights in public urban areas and taking his shots discreetly and out of view, bringing controlled lighting out into an uncontrolled urban environment, to make sure the subject is clear, and emphasised but also so that they could not be in a more natural state as they are not even aware they are being photographed. His most noted work in this style was his series Heads that was done using a controlled lighting mixed in with the standard lights in the New York train station and a hidden camera, in order to catch commuters when they are absorbed in their own world, their own natural 'bubble' state if you will.

As he captures people on their commute he actually captures people in a rather intimate and personal moment, as during a commute most people are not social, everyone becomes separate within their personal space focusing on their journey of A to B and nothing more. So it is a very solitary and honest state of self one becomes involved in as you switch off to being no longer aware of your surroundings.

In capturing this moment Dicorcia captures an incredibly honest state of being with these people.

Reflecting on Dicorica and Newman's work there are elements of both I would like to combine. Phillip Lorca Dicorcia captures people in a natural honest state, which is a theme I want to centralise my portrait around, the idea of simplistic honesty, however Dicorcia uses the same lighting for every shot, and his set up and style is very reminiscent of advertising lighting, and I want something far more naturalistic. This is where I want to sample Arnold Newman's approach, as I first simply looked at his 'Stravinsky' as I was so impressed with the visuals of this piece, however looking over many of his other portraits:

Willie 'The Lion' Smith

John F. Kennedy

You can see that Arnold Newman does not stick to one visual style with his portraits, he instead tailors his entire mise en scene around his model, for instance his 'Willie The Lion Smith' is tailored completely to a traditional jazz scene, with the smokey club, the studio lights in shot, and the stacked bar chairs. The same with his John F. Kennedy, with the powerful low angle on the white pillars of the white house, but with Kennedy himself a more humble and less overbearing figure.

I wish to take this idea of tailoring my mise en scene to my model from Arnold Newman, but also I would like to capture a sense of honesty and naturalism, so I shall combine the ideas of Dicorcia and Newman.

I will tailor my lighting, and setting to something simple that will also reflect on my model being a blues musician, and I will simply ask him to play, hoping that after a short while my model will forget his studio surroundings, and begin to simply play as he would at any street corner or venue, and this will help me achieve my sense of simple honesty.

Posing and Lighting Exercise

As part of our portrait unit we spent two days in small groups practicing lighting and poses, creating different emotions and stereotypes through subtle changes in lighting and posture, experimenting mostly with standard reflectors and soft boxes on Broncolor studio flash systems.

 Utilising a few objects at hand in the studio or from our bags, we created several job role stereotypes, a builder, a waitress, a cleaner and a scholar. We altered our lighting set ups with minor adjustments for every shot, however the main focus of this first exercise was posture and framing, subtleties like the hunched scholar, immersed in his book, looking of his shoulder at the world he pays little attention to. The builder shown through straight body shots, to show a simplicity and honesty, but also a pride in the worker standing straight by his tools, looking directly at the camera.
This exercise was designed to make us think on our feet about how we tailor the posture of our models to suit the intent of the photograph.

Our next exercise was similar to the first however this time we focused on posture and expression without props, and altered our lighting to suit our intent far more. Instead of job roles, this time we focused on emotions, or traits, like pride, sorrow, honesty or arrogance.

We switched back and forth between soft and hard lighting, we also paid a lot of attention to our camera angles, for instance a low angle to create a sense of power for pride, or a high angle for sorrow.

Studio Shoot

On the day of my portrait shoot I decided on experimenting with two different sets of postures on two rolls of film. 

My lighting set up used a prolite with a large softbox as my main light, which was positioned above my subject looking downwards on him. My fill light was also a prolite, however I used a standard reflector attachment and utilised two black polly boards to create a strip spotlight to highlight the left hand side of my subject, this light was set 3 power stops down from my main light.

On my first roll of film I asked my subject to simply sit with a neutral expression and look towards the camera, I leant his hard black guitar case against his shoulder, using my fill light to catch the edge of the case. The idea behind this was an attempt at mimicking Arnold Newman's 'Stravinksy', I wanted a standard portrait shot of my subject looking towards the camera, and tried to silhouette the guitar case much like Stravinksy's piano. I kept the brick wall as my backdrop in order to maintain my idea of honesty, as a black or white backdrop makes this an obvious studio piece, but the wall gives it an ambiguous but everyday setting. I was not pleased however with the framing of these shots, a guitar case proved too small to effectively recreate Newman's 'Stravinsky' and my models expression and posture was obviously too awkward.

For my second roll of film I kept my lighting set up the same, but repositioned my subject so the fill light would catch and highlight his left edge more. For this series I asked him to merely play a set piece as though he was busking on the street, which eventually relaxed my model and he began to play naturally, his expression and mentality focusing only on his music. With him involved in playing I simply shot slowly and steadily as he continued to play, in order to capture a more honest expression and posture from him, which I found to be far more effective.

This shot was my final selection from my contact sheet, as I found my model to have the best posture and expression in this frame. I found I preferred his posture most in this frame, as it is clear he in the middle of playing by his hands and arms positioning on the guitar. I also prefer his expression most in this frame, as his entire face is visible, but he is not looking or focused on his surroundings, he is clearly seen as involved only in the music he is playing. My idea of honesty and simplicity in identity I believe to be quite clear in this photograph, as the lighting is very reminiscent of older style Blues and Jazz musician's portraits, being very soft on the skin with clear texture, but drawing on many shadows in the posture of the musician as well. The brick wall behind works well here as well, as the lighting is unnatural and that of a studio, but the brick wall creates an ambiguity in his location, for instance this could easily be at a venue or practice room that he is playing in. The fact that my model is not focused at all on the camera reinforces my intent as well, as he is simply himself, and his self is simply his music.