Idea Development
I decided to do a shoot of Jess and take photos of her positioned as the character Nora Helmer. I wanted to experiment different ways I could tell the story of Nora Helmer.
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| I think that this photo is really good characterisation of Nora Helmer. At the end of the play Nora takes off her ring and leaves it on the table and then walks out and leaves Torvald. I wanted to show this in this photograph by having her hold the ring out to her husband with a stern expression on her face. This shows she is certain she wants to do this and she isn't going to let anything hold her back. I think that because she is out of focus and the main focal point is the ring in her hand there is a powerful story to be told through this image. |
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| Through this image I wanted top show the result of what her marriage to Torvald has done to her. She has been puppetified and has been distorted by the conventions of society and she is trying to hold herself up. |
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| I also like how this photo focus' on the ring in her hand and her vacant expression on her face shows that she has no doubt about her behaviour and she is certain of what it is that she is doing. |
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| Through this photograph I wanted to show how Nora Helmer is wanting to break out of this stereotype she has found herself trapped in and that it will drive her to insanity if she doesn't get chance to escape. |
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| Through this photograph I wanted to show the stress this marriage is causing her and her upset and boredom she feels. |
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| Through this photograph I wanted to show Nora, broken out of the stereotype of being upright and smart to being a slob on the floor. |
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| This photo didn't work as well as I had hoped, as I had hoped that I would have been able to focus onto the ring and have the feet out of focus in the background. |
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I wanted to then go on and develop the photographs I took of Trinity and Marshall is response to Liora K. I wished to photoshop the images and make them into double negatives so that I could print them out onto acetate and then scratch the words into them in order to make them look more brutal and thought provoking. I have prated out my double negatives and have experimented with them in the dark room. As part of this I want to trial double exposure. When I have finished exposing the negatives and working on them in the dark room I want to try out with scratching words into the printed photographs.
SHOOT 2
Over half term I did a photoshoot in a field where I focused on the story of Nora Helmer and her family.
"I've been your doll wife here just as at home I was papa's doll child… and the children have been my dolls in their turn."
This photograph was composed in order to speak out the story of Nora Helmer in A Doll's House. In this photograph Ben represents Torvald Helmer who has his hand over his wife's eyes hiding the world from her. Nora then does the exact same to her child. Their blank and vacant expressions show that at the moment there is no remorse. I think that the choice I have made to photoshop this photo into black and white was a good idea as it shows just how meek their lives are.
"All I know is that this is necessary for me"
I think that this photograph is a strong one as it shows a very stern attitude coming from Torvald who has his hand covering Nora's eyes. I think the thing that stands out about this photograph is that Torvald is not looking at his wife but away from her and straight ahead, this represents his looking toward the future and to the world outside without letting his wife have even so much as a glimpse.
"You've never loved me Torvald, you've only found it pleasant to be in love with me."
I think that this photograph is powerful as Nora's facial expression shows that of loss and pleading. She is being held back by her husband and yet she fights it not. She just accepts everything he does even though she knows she doesn't want to.
"Our home has been nothing but a playroom."
I also think that this photograph is powerful as there is a vivid position of power that Torvald Helmer has and yet he handles it so calmly.
"You don't understand me, and I've never understood you."
I think the angle that this photograph has been taken from shows how this is a chain reaction and that Torvald Helmer's actions have an impact of Nora's actions which then one day will have an impact on their children's actions and so on.
"You and Papa have committed a grievous sin against me."
The look of loss and desperation in this photo are what intrigues the audience. The arm being held back portrays a lack of freedom.
"Tomorrow I shall go, to my old home, it'll be easier for me to find something to do there."
This photograph shows the subtlety of fear, by this point, Nora now knows she isn't free, but that she has a plan and yet she fears that plan will not work.
"[The sound of a door slamming]"
I think that this photograph is powerful as in my Nora Helmer timeline I would picture this image as after she has left her husband and she is out there, she is free and there is nothing holding her back. The wind in her hair represents her sigh of relief and her expression represents the fact she doesn't regret anything.
"I can't stay here with you any longer"
The holding out of the ring. I shot this photo again with Jenny as my model. With this photograph I really like the shadows on her face. I like that she herself is out of focus bringing all the focus onto the ring that she has taken off and is handing back to her husband. I think the high contrast highlights the ring further.
"Here's your ring back - give me mine."
These next two photographs I like as a pair as the switch in focal point gives out two different messages. The focus on the ring in the first photograph shows that this photograph is about Nora Helmer leaving her husband and the second photographs focus on the face shows that at the same time she is feeling nothing else and that she is certain about what it is she is doing "I've never seen things so clearly and certainly as I do tonight"
"I need to get to know myself and the world outside."
"I can't help it, I don't love you anymore."
"I believe that before anything else - I am a human being just as much as you are… or at any rate I shall try to become one."
"You arranged everything to suit your own tastes and so I came to have the same tastes as yours, or I pretended to. I'm not quite sure which. Perhaps it was a bit of both… sometimes one and sometimes the other."
SHOOT 2 INVERTS
I then inverted all of these photos making them into digital negatives so that I am able to print them out onto and then develop them in the dark room. I thought that these photos would look even better and really tell the story if they were turned into digital negatives and then printed in the dark room where I have the opportunity to be even more creative with them and try experimenting with different things. I like that with digital negatives you have the freedom to be able to scratch into them so that when you expose them to light with photographic paper underneath you then have a fascinating effect as the scratches come through. Also I like all the other manual things you can do with a physical photograph in front of you. You can burn the edges or scribble on them or scrunch them up. The choices are endless.
DARK ROOM OUTCOMES
I really enjoyed experimenting with these photographs in the dark room as I felt that I had the freedom to take these photographs in any direction I wanted. My favourite image by far is the one where I put my hand in the developer and then placed my hand over where I thought Naomi's hand holding the ring was and then completed the process after that. I like this photograph because it is so simple yet so powerful. The hand within the hand tells a strong story of one who wants to give back what they were once given. I also like my other photograph where I placed various amounts of hand prints onto it that only when you look closely you can tell they are hand prints. I think this photograph speaks out about the distortion of society as because at first you cant tell that they are hands you therefore cant tell what your true sources are. When actually those hands are covering a blank canvas and are painting a picture of a distorted society where the man has control over the woman and the woman has control over the child.
I have rotated all of these but for some reason blogger wasn't feeling that.
This is one of my film photographs which I have developed in the Dark Room. I placed my hands over the photographic paper whilst it was exposed to light so that I would have two hands on the final developed photograph. I wanted to do this with hands because hands represent the grasp that men have over women in the society that Nora Helmer was living in.
This is another photograph that I took on a film camera. I staged it so that my previous dark room work was featured in it. I used Naomi as my model holding and then proceeding to rip up the dark room outcomes. I wanted to do this to show that this is the aftermath of Nora Helmer leaving her husband and how she wipes her slate clean by erasing all memory of him. This is my interpretation of the ending of the play based upon the script. Right at the end of the play Nora and Torvalds conversation ends with.
Nora: I couldn't take anything from a stranger.
Helmer: Nora - can't I ever be anything more than a stranger to you?
At this point in the play she has shredded any hope Torvald may have in her return.
SOMETHING THAT CAUGHT MY EYE
I saw my sister's shadow on the wall next to the Doll's house we own and I thought it was the perfect photo opportunity and so I shot it. I liked it because it could tell the story of Nora Helmer outside of the Doll's house.
With this photograph, I love the grainy effect that it has created.
Planning a shoot
The first shoot I have planned for this first week back is one on Thursday. I am bringing in my mums wedding dress and I have asked Oliver to bring in a suit and I am going to stage a happy wedding and do all self portraiture. I want to show how the marriage between Nora and Torvald started out well but how he managed to take her freedom away. I am also bringing in lots of dolls so I can do a response to Rachel Stone who is one of my essay photographers. I want to take pictures of myself in a wedding dress with all these dolls representing the stereotypical responsibility of a woman in a marriage.
The second shoot I am planning to do will be on Wednesday afternoon where I will be taking photographs of people who's bodies I have written on in either black or white face paint as my response to Liora K.'s photography.
WEDDING SHOOT
Lynn Hershman Leeson Shoot
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