Reflections on Self- Portrait
It's interesting considering the process of building a self-portrait. It seems that we each enter into this assignment with some specific idea or concept in mind. And then we shoot, record, and build our materials with which to carry out this idea. For some (speaking to myself) we don't always get the footage we hoped for, or perhaps along the way we discover some new objective or idea. The process of curating this project is somewhat of a self-portrait (in and of itself) if you really think about it.
In my own work I had set out to build a self-portrait by capturing the reflections and reactions in others, as a reflection of me. What I found was that most of the subjects we either trying to please me by posing or smiled for the camera just out of habit. To work around this I often conversed with them and then took a candid photo when they weren't consciously on display/posing. But through this process, I also discovered that my manipulation of the subjects was compromising my "vision".
But this too is okay. I wanted to take myself seriously and try to discover more about myself through the reactions of others, but I came to learn that I couldn't truly manipulate others to authenticate this objective. And neither could I truly find a reflection of myself through surveying others, for the simple reason that I'm not in charge of other people's reactions and how they affect me. I am I charge, however, of how I hold myself, and this realization lead me to understand that I should strive to take myself less seriously, or at least be okay with both the positive and negative responses that come my way.
I found such varied responses in my developed photos, and as such, reformatted my final edit to be something both brooding, and comic. I sought to recombine these elements to create disjuncture in my work, as a means to reflect my own distorted perspective, indecision and my willingness to grow in my self-regard and not take myself too seriously.
In my own work I had set out to build a self-portrait by capturing the reflections and reactions in others, as a reflection of me. What I found was that most of the subjects we either trying to please me by posing or smiled for the camera just out of habit. To work around this I often conversed with them and then took a candid photo when they weren't consciously on display/posing. But through this process, I also discovered that my manipulation of the subjects was compromising my "vision".
But this too is okay. I wanted to take myself seriously and try to discover more about myself through the reactions of others, but I came to learn that I couldn't truly manipulate others to authenticate this objective. And neither could I truly find a reflection of myself through surveying others, for the simple reason that I'm not in charge of other people's reactions and how they affect me. I am I charge, however, of how I hold myself, and this realization lead me to understand that I should strive to take myself less seriously, or at least be okay with both the positive and negative responses that come my way.
I found such varied responses in my developed photos, and as such, reformatted my final edit to be something both brooding, and comic. I sought to recombine these elements to create disjuncture in my work, as a means to reflect my own distorted perspective, indecision and my willingness to grow in my self-regard and not take myself too seriously.
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