JENNIFER LOOMIS - PHOTOGRAPHER

Jennifer Loomis - photographer

Jennifer Loomis is a fine art photographer in the subject of pregnant women. She has written a book called ‘Portraits of pregnancy’.

Loomis’ background is as an international photojournalist working in some of the most difficult war-torn places in the world such as Rwanda where she covered the aftermath of the genocide there. In an interview with Kuow, she spoke in detail about how terrible it was seeing all the people suffer. That was in the late 1990s.

Going back to the early 1990s Lomas used to photograph naked women as more of a hobby and an escape from her photojournalism job. One day a pregnant friend came to her and asked to be photographed. She had never seen a pregnant body and was amazed with the beautiful curves. This first encounter with a pregnant belly transfixed her. She went back to her photojournalistic job and mentioned to her photographer friends that she might switch to pregnant women for which there was no genre in those days. They talked her out of it saying that she would never earn a living.

Then after being in Ruanda she decided to give the maternity photography a go. She says that with her background she can bring the larger story to a single image – even in pregnant women. At that time Annie Leibowitz was being asked to continually take pregnancy photographs as an aftermath of the Demi Moore shot. She passed all these women onto Loomis.

Loomis finds the shape of the belly unique and loves the way light falls on it. She would ask herself ‘where is this shape in the galleries’? This beautiful shape really had not been seen in the art world and she felt that she wanted to document it.

Loomis considers pregnant women her art form. She brings emotion and narrative to her photographs. Interestingly when she decided to market herself she placed an ad in a maternity magazine but was rung by the magazine whose publishers said that they couldn’t publish that type of photograph. It was far too risqué. This was only 10 years ago. She was shocked. She changed the image to one in which the model was more covered up and still is very careful when using her images in magazines.

Loomis’ book ‘Portraits of pregnancy’ documents 50 women. Quotations and stories, told by Hugo Kugiya , accompany the images. Loomis works in Seattle.

References http://www.kuow.org/mp3high/mp3/KUOWPresents/20091003JenniferLoomis.mp3 (radio interview)

http://berkelouw.com.au/catalogue/books/9781591810827/portraits-of-pregnancy-the-birth-of-a-mother

http://www.jenniferloomis.com/

Robert Austin Fitch - glamour maternity photographer

Robert Austin Fitch - Glamour Maternity Photography

One maternity photographer that I like is Robert Austin Fitch, a New York photographer. He talks about capturing the magic and the love. He takes a portable studio to the client’s home. He generally back lights his subject; he has his models semi-naked; he sometimes used soft white flowing material props to make the image softer and more romantic. He calls himself a fine art photographer.

References:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glamour_photography#Popular_portraiture

http://www.robfitch.com/

My photo-documentary style

In September 2010 we had an exercise with Belinda to do some photojournalism photos at home. I quite liked these & plan to do this sort of image. I would like to get more of the room in but I had to straighten these a lot & so lost the sides in so doing.

This room has lots of natural light but I still used 1600ISO with 1.80 & f2.8. This means that I shall definitely have to have quite a bit of lighting.

BETH YARNELLE EDWARDS - photographer

Beth Yarnelle Edwards - Photographer

Beth Yarnelle Edwards is a San Francisco based photographer who likes to photograph people in their natural environment. She re-creates scenes of their daily life. She has done this in the US as well as Europe.

References:

http://www.bethyarnelleedwards.com/#a=0&at=0&mi=1&pt=0&pi=2&s=1&p=-1

JAN STEEN - painter

Jan Steen - Artist

Jan Steen was a 17th century Dutch artist who depicted families in chaos. He gives a great insight to family life at that time. He is able to show the energy between the family members. His subjects are active and often merry. He was one of the masters at that time. He was brilliant.

References:

JULIE BLACKMORE - Photographer

Julie Blackmore - photographer

I found these interesting shots taken by Julie Blackmore of family situations. Well actually they are composites. Blackmore sees the family scene almost in a comical way. She has placed little people in beautiful homes where they make the idealised family life. They have a dream-like feel about them. This is very different to Crewdson (whom I researched last semester) in that his are more grimy.

Blackmore comes from a large family and has many nieces & nephews aho she uses in her photographs along with her own children. She does well commercially with many big clients.

Although these are not the sort of images I want from my same sex families, I quite like the sparseness of the room set-up and the little children in the big grand spaces.

References;

http://blog.janstaller.net/2010/09/30/julie-blackmon-at-robert-mann-gallery/

TACO ANEMA - photographer

Taco Anema – Photographer

Taco Anema is a Dutch photographer who in 2009 had a great exhibition at Hous Museum Marseilles on Dutch households. His collection was 100 families and he’d been working on it since 2002. His portraits of families are not the formal ones such as those of well-known German photographer Thomas Struth. Rather they are informal scenes. While the rooms are not earthy and untidy, he still manages to portray a warmth in the family. Each member is ‘doing their own thing’ and not looking at the camera.

Taco Anema studied sociology in Amsterdam then changed to photography – a great background to documentary photography which he has been doing since 1975. His photos often documented his political stance and used his photographs as an instrument of activism.

Toco Anema straightens her photos or they are taken so the verticals are perpendicular to the ground. I have a tendency to always straighten my shots. I was planning in this exercise to not necessarily straighten this verticals so photos may be taken from higher or lower to the subjects. If I can resist the urge to straighten them - well it depends what they look like, it might work well. I intend to use a wide angle lens and I plan to accept a little distortion a bit like Ron Nicolayson does. I'm not quite sure what I will do with lighting yet - I would like to use available light but I don't think it will be enough .

Below is an example of well renouned German family portrait photographer Thomas Struth. Whereas Struth sets is families up in a formal way, Anema has a much more casual approach which I find much more appealing.

Reference:

http://www.huismarseille.nl/en/collection/photographer/taco-anema

http://bintphotobooks.blogspot.com/2009/03/dutch-households-by-taco-anema.html

RON NICOLAYSON - photographer

Ron Nicolaysen - photographer

Ron Nicolaysen is a fine art and documentary photographer based in New York. He studied in Wesconsen and has worked as a successful fashion photographer in France as well as New York. He is influenced by the photographers Harry Callahan, Lee Friedlander, Duane Michals and Ansel Adams. He has a big interest in human trafficking and the advancement of women. He exhibits and also has workshops and seminars. His client list when in fashion photography is extremely impressive.

These photographs of Ron Nicolaysen's seem to be part-portrait and part-documentary. The subject is mostly looking at the camera but there is a lot of the surrounds in the photo that tells a story. They are quite raw images taken with a wide angle lens which adds to the narrative we are seeing of the character.. I love the use of the wide angle lens and I intend to use one in my documentary photos.

The top image was in the book 'Friendship, Family love and laughter'. The stillness of this photo with the almost empty streets beside them makes it a very dynamic composition.

Nicolaysen often looks down on his subjects which is quite haunting and makes them look small in a big world.

Reference:

http://rnicolaysen.com/2/artist.asp?ArtistID=17430&AKey=4J924LTX

Blackwell, Geoff; Friendship, Family love and laughter 2009

ANNIE LEIBOVITZ AND THE DEMI MOORE PHOTOGRAPH – a personal view

ANNIE LEIBOVITZ AND THE DEMI MOORE PHOTOGRAPH – a personal view

The Demi Moore photograph by Annie Leibovitz which appeared on the cover of the August 1991 Vanity Fair magazine was very daring at the time, in fact scandalous. However it sold out very quickly. But was it porn? Many people found it offensive and there were newsagents who sold it wrapped in white paper.

Before this time pregnant women were not photographed very often and certainly not naked nor semi-naked. Once pregnant, their bodies ceased to be ‘feminine’ in the desirable sense. Men stopped looking at them. In fact a naked pregnant women as I mentioned above, looked grotesque.

I illustrate here with photos of myself during my 4 pregnancies between 1969 & 1978 (I couldn’t find any on the net). I then found some photos taken during the 1980s. These were pre-Demi. These days they talk about ‘maternity fashion trends’ with women looking gorgeous, stylish and sensual. Clothes stick to the bump and enhance it. While I understand that these current photos are on a model, there would not have been maternity clothes modelled in the old days.

Leibovitz’s photo of Demi Moore changed the woman’s image of herself while pregnant. Once the Hollywood actors ‘got permission’ to show themselves during pregnancy, there was a huge change in the way pregnant women were seen by the rest of the community. One of Leibovitz’s comment’s was: ‘it’s gratifying that the picture helped make pregnant women feel less awkward or embarrassed about their bodies’.

After the 1991 Demi front cover, other female actors started appearing on the front covers of various magazines. I found a lot of front covers – many more than I expected!

All of this led to young pregnant women asking photographers to photograph them in a sensual way. Most don’t want to be fully naked but the suggestion of something sexy is there. They want to record their bump and they want to show that they looked pretty good during their pregnancy. They dress with clingy fashionable clothes. The whole image of the pre-Demi mums-to-be has changed.

This is the basis of the photographs which I have taken during this semester. They are part-portrait and part-fashion. They are not necessarily a visual representation of who the mums-to-be really are because there is probably no other time in their lives when they would pose semi-naked in front of a camera. It is their way of saying that while I was pregnant I was still a sensual female.

Post script: It is difficult to read the writing attached to the photos of me. What I said was that the 1976 photo with bare stomach showing was hidden under another photo in my album with just my head showing. I remember wishing that I hadn't lifted my top so I could display the photo properly. I would never have shown the photo to anyone as it was rude and unattractive.

References:

http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/features/2008/10/annie_excerpt200810

http://www.pregnancy-parenting.becomegorgeous.com/pregnancy_advice/maternity_fashion_trends-1567.html