Christine ( nan) Faceless portrait with memory box ( un-edited)

 

Christine Humphreys

31/03/1944

Themes: collections from the 60s to date

List Of contents of the TRUNK

Photos +Photo albums (loads)

Art Work from my Debbies O levels

Large Black and White Photographs from 80s

Negatives

Cards + Letter + Notes from everyone important to me throughout the years

1 Hippy Afgan coat from Kuala Lumpar in the early 70s. ( Loved it with my maxi cheesecloth dresses)

1 Dynesty 3 piece with lovely large shoulder pads from the 80s. Gorgeous!

Wigs for dressing up parties

Long Blonde

Short Black

Tina Turner ( I do a mean simply the best even with flat shoes and long skirts these days)

Spare throw or two for the bed on cold nights

 

Katie (Auntie) faceless portrait with memory box ( un-edited)

 

Katie Windsor



29/08/1969



Themes :  Travel and
childhood 



1 plastic house - free gift with some Italian cakes circa
1983. (Lake Garda)



1 mini pottery frog. 



1 Pippa Doll ...she disco dances and I loved her frock.



1 charm bracelet - chrimbo prez 1978. Has a matchstick, frog
& chick charm.



1 Journal from 1985. CRINGE



1 Homemade record cover. Gene Pitney, 24 hrs from Tulsa used
to dance round the living room to this one



11 Greetings cards, from grom & grandad & other lovelies
who are no longer with us.



1 Canal of Britain memo book. Souvenier from a school trip.
filled with schoolmates autographs



1 Photo processing envelope from Australia - birthplace but
from before I was born...not sure whenn I picked this up.



1 Hospital Bill from Birth..... proof that I do exist ;)



1 TV & Antena Bill - also from Australia 



2 Swimming certificates - thus confirming my sporting
prowess. Loved swimming.



3 address books. my love of stationary started early..and I
still like collecting friends



1 school play script.Cinderella. I was the Town Crier - I
was robbed.



1 My little brothers birth bracelet 



2 foreign train tickets Milan & Venice I think...Happy
Days!



1 hand written directions to the pub. More Happy Days.



6 Penpal letter..... social networking at its finest



2 Typed song lyrics. Ultravox & Elaine Paige; Memories.
RANDOM



1 Photocopied picture of Elvis Costello. ?



1" A daughter is someone who always cares book"
from me mum. 



Lewis's Dept Store Badge. Hated the job ( shoe dept) 



Lewis Paper Bag. 

Debbie (Mother) faceless portrait with memory box ( un-edited)

 

Debbie Jenkins

18/11/1963

Themes:  Family Photographs

Family Photographs recording, days out, holidays and celebrations and milestones

Bronze blood donor badge – from when I donated 25 pints of blood – not all in one sitting!

1996 nursery school tea towel with sally’s self-portrait on

Parts of a fancy dress Kiss costume

A poem written by sally about the seaside

Hand Printed black and white photo of Katie

15 Birthday and thank you cards

Triumph Spitfire car badge

Red toy Ferrari (one day)

Blockbuster membership card

A black and white test strip of one of the first photos I ever developed at home (baby brother Tim)

Handmade ABC child’s toy bag

A lovely note from my mum

Sketch book from when I was 16

David Bowie , Elvis Costello, Michaell Jackson , Radio Stars , Ramones , The Clash and Billy idol concert tickets. My 7” record collection was sold to pay for my first cars road tax.

Congratulation cards from Sally and Charlottes birth

Favourite baby grow

Hand knitted baby blankets from proud grand parents 

Me faceless portrait with memory box ( un-edited)

For the next 6 blog post I have included a small collection of the images taken on shoot day . Some I believe work ,some don’t work for obvious reasons . Below the images I will be writing the persoans name , date of birth , the themes contained in there memory boxes and in there words the content of the boxes . I will narrow the images down in the editing stages .

 

Sally Jenkins

29-04-1992

Themes –  Youth, leaving school ,First experiences

 
172 photographs –All shapes and sizes some mounted some framed some defaced
17 greetings cards – mainly from my nan because of her awesome poetry within
2 High School Planner
14 Gig/ Festival Tickets
4 Lanyards included my backstage VIP photography pass for nice n sleazy festival
3 Jewellery boxes minus the jewellery
10 club/ festival wristbands
4 Photo keyrings
A mobile phone which looks and feels like a brick
7 hand written notes and drawing
Half a five pound note
2nd place rosette from a horse jumping competition
2 badges
A drinking straw featuring a pretty funky paper parrot
 Pink whistle from Aunties Hen do
A Primary school cricket champion medal
My prom dress price label
2 bracelets made by friends
1 plastic D from a Fiat Tipo 1.6 diesel
Fake gold Hard-core necklace pendant shaped like an apple
An aeroplane emergency exist window sticker ….oups
A sim card
A guitar plectrum
Flashing rave ring with 3 different tempo settings from enter shakari music video
Southern comfort sequined mask
Cross pendant
Comic Googly eye ring in which I’ve had too much wear
A Hardrock café drinks stirrer
Rubber “save the music” charity wristband
Homemade CD cover for the best CD I ever created courtesy of Limewire
2 posters
Year 11 Prom Ticket
A strong bow cider label , My first bottle and I’ve never looked back
My GCSE name tag
Beathurder festival guide booklet
Venue Night club flyer – My favourite ever club
A Megazone score sheet

Concept for final piece

Concept for final piece

So its that time to start putting all my bits of research and influences into my own imagery. Dead line is approaching and I am still to take my images, edit my images and finales my series.

Sticking to the themes of family album portraiture that I have been exploring in my blog I am going to create a series of un conventional family photographs. I am going to use my 6 female family members and photograph them with there memory boxes . This includes myself sally Jenkins , my sister charlotte Jenkins , my mother Debbie Jenkins, Both my aunties Kate Windsor and Dawn Higgins and Finally My nan Christine Humphreys . To make the photographs an un-stereotypical virsion of a family photo I will be creating faceless portraits by cropping them at the shoulders/ neck so there face is not in the images .I will be focusing on the memory boxes that they are holding in the images.

I will not be showing the contents of the boxes , as explained on my Schrodinger’s cat blog post .

I have decided to photograph the subjects in their own surroundings, like Williams Egglestons work I want the photographs to be as real and every day as possible. I am going to ask my subjects to be photographed in the same room there memory boxes are usually kept .

I will also be looking for details in my faceless images that mirror glimpses of my subjects personality or that quirky features that reiterate that fact that these images are suppose to be ordinary , Ie . possible include my odd socks or my nans slippers , these details I will experiment with whilst shooting

And finally I have created a contents list for both mine and my auntie Katie’s memory box so far in the format of a list . Again to add a splash of personality and life to each image I will ask each individual subject to write they own memory box contents however they please. These could include personal story’s or the bare minimum, that’s up to them. I’m still uncertain as to how to present the contents list with the imagery. I will experiment with both a Karen Knorr style like at the very beginning of the project where the contents are a Photoshop composite and apart of the frame image or individually framed beside the solo standing image.

Let the shooting commence , beginning with me !

William Eggleston

William Eggleston - the pioneer of colour photography
Known for his rich and complex images of the American South, William Eggleston is largely credited with establishing the acceptance of colour in fine art photography.
Eggleston began to experiment with colour in the 1960s. At that time, colour photography was principally associated with commercial industries such as advertising, and was considered unsuitable for fine art photography. In 1972 he started to make prints using a highly complex and expensive process called ‘dye transfer’, which allows various colours within a photographic print to be printed as separations. Each colour is printed in its richest form, maintaining strong red and green tones within a single image. The prints are also extremely durable and will not fade.
Mostly shooting in and around his hometown of Memphis, Tennessee, Eggleston depicts the banal and everyday. His work is frequently characterised by elements such as bold colourful interiors, cars and gasoline stations, and portraits of individuals known to Eggleston as well as strangers encountered in the street. Eggleston pays close attention to the formal organisation of the frame, often employing diagonal lines and reflections, but he also relishes strong contrasts in colour with vivid reds, blues and greens.
Though these images record a particular place at a certain point in time, Eggleston is not interested in their documentary qualities. Instead, when asked what he is photographing, Eggleston simply answers ‘Life today’.
William Eggleston was born in 1939 in Memphis, Tennessee, where he lives and works.





William Eggleston in my opinion has the ability to make the everyday , epic. My memory box project is also everyday and I will be taking inspiration from Eggleston whilst photographing my final images . Snap shot aesthetics , bold colours and a different perspective of the everyday . His images often consist of a tight crop , hiding the fuller scene and often his compositions are un even with main focuses being at either side of the frame .
I  want to have William Egglestons frame of mind when I start to shoot for my final series of images and make the everyday , unordinary . It has also come to my attention that in a number of Egglestons portraits are purposely made anonymous by either cropping out there heads or just making sure they are faceless in the portraits . After Camera Lucida and Barthes decision not to show the image of his mother in the winter garden , the research I have conducted on affect theory and the copious amounts on un-stereotypical family album. I think it is only fitting that like William Eggleston I leave me models which will be my family I will be experimenting with faceless portraits and concentrate on the connection between there body language and there memory box.

schrodinger's cat - super position !!!

You may be thinking how on earth has my research jumped from memory with in genders to a quantum physic theory about  cat in a box .  I was told about possibly reading into the Schrodinger cat theory by a tutor at university very early on in the project , i went home Google-d it and it completely confused my mind . I can see the obvious link between it being a closed box but i was struggling to connect this theory into a concept for my work , it wasn't until i read Roland Barthes Camera Lucida that i was able to create a theoretical link to my work .

Like the cat the contents of a memory box is either dead or alive .
The individual possessions in somebody's memory box generally have no "Affect"(Affect Theory) on other viewers , same with family photo albums , unless you know the people photographed or in a memory boxes case the memory collected they can all be very "samey" and will not provoke sentiment.. Dead cat !
On the other hand the box could do the complete opposite and be a  reinforcement of memory ,be nostalgic and have copious amounts of "affect" on the viewer. Alive cat !!
In this state of superposition my viewers can only be intrigued as to what substances are in or not in the box. What happens if i do not show my viewers the contents of the box but just the closed box itself ? and with the images or sat next to the images a contents list of the objects possibly within so the viewers can create there own interpretations of what is in the box and who owns the box.
Not allowing the box to be open and contents revielved means we do not have to force upon a decision the memory are there forever frozen times in my frames.Curiosity literally could kills the cat or in this instance the private memory.A message about my earlier research on how digitalising you family photo albums or memory boxes devalues there "affect" some things should remain private. 

http://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/Schrodingers-cat

Schrödinger's cat is a famous illustration of the principle in quantum theory ofsuperposition, proposed by Erwin Schrödinger in 1935. Schrödinger's cat serves to demonstrate the apparent conflict between what quantum theory tells us is true about the nature and behavior of matter on the microscopic level and what we observe to be true about the nature and behavior of matter on the macroscopic level -- everything visible to the unaided human eye.

Here's Schrödinger's (theoretical) experiment: We place a living cat into a steel chamber, along with a device containing a vial of hydrocyanic acid. There is, in the chamber, a very small amount of hydrocyanic acid, a radioactive substance. If even a single atom of the substance decays during the test period, a relay mechanism will trip a hammer, which will, in turn, break the vial and kill the cat. 

The observer cannot know whether or not an atom of the substance has decayed, and consequently, cannot know whether the vial has been broken, the hydrocyanic acid released, and the cat killed. Since we cannot know, according to quantum law, the cat is both dead and alive, in what is called a superposition of states. It is only when we break open the box and learn the condition of the cat that the superposition is lost, and the cat becomes one or the other (dead or alive). This situation is sometimes called quantum indeterminacy or the observer's paradox: the observation or measurement itself affects an outcome, so that the outcome as such does not exist unless the measurement is made. (That is, there is no single outcome unless it is observed.)

We know that superposition actually occurs at the subatomic level, because there are observable effects of interference, in which a single particle is demonstrated to be in multiple locations simultaneously. What that fact implies about the nature of reality on the observable level (cats, for example, as opposed to electrons) is one of the stickiest areas of quantum physics. Schrödinger himself is rumored to have said, later in life, that he wished he had never met that cat.

Definition of super position 

Superposition is a principle of quantum theory that describes a challenging concept about the nature and behavior of matter and forces at the sub-atomic level. The principle of superposition claims that while we do not know what the state of any object is, it is actually in all possible states simultaneously, as long as we don't look to check. It is the measurement itself that causes the object to be limited to a single possibility.