Cupofpea.com

www.cupofpea.com
'Banana bag man'

We were shown the blog 'cupofpea' at the beginning of term. The blog has been created by a photographer called Rasmus Vasli. The blog has been created to share his portrait photographs in which he specialises in. "Cup of Pea is about walking the streets and stumble upon people that I somehow find interesting or inspiring, take their portrait, and tell a little story from my meeting with them". (cupofpea.com). I have been following the blog since we were shown it. I am very much interested in portrait photography and consider it to be one my strong point in photography. So i take great delight in looking through recent portrait photographs of strangers in various countries with different backgrounds. Rasmus always puts a little paragraph underneath each photograph to outline why he took it and who the person is. This creates almost like a story of his travels if you read through all of them. You get a great sense of adventure and travelling when you look at the pictures. Besides my love for the blog and what it offers to young photographers, his work is captivating and never dull to look at. You are confronted with people from different cultures and backgrounds and the portraits are diverse. You get a narrative from every image, when you can analyse the picture from the description you are given. Overall, I will proceed to follow this blog and take inspiration from Rasmus Vasli's work.

Brendan Walker, The Thrill-Sensing Auto-Portrait Machine.

Brendan Walkers Autoportrait Machine, 2005
Image taken from: http://we-make-money-not-art.com

My friend recently lent me one of her photography books to have a read through in my spare time. The book is called 'Photography' by John Ingledew. It is a basic introduction book for students and contains facts about photography and also photographers work. On page 148 I came across an interesting photographer called Brendan Walker. His pictures were immediatly interesting to look at, and the description of the work even more interesting. Walker designed a camera that is controlled by human emotion. During a fairground ride the shutter is fire at the thrill peak. The pictures are very aesthetically pleasing as well as interesting to look at. There are light trails which portray movement in the images and the subjects faces show a range of different emotions. His work is innovative and unique and it is really refreshing to see new techniques and the outcome of those techniques. Very inspiring...

Instagram, does it de-value photography?

Picture taken from: http://instagr.am/

A few weeks back there was  a discussion on line regarding Instagram and whether the new application de-values photography. This is the description the application uses to describe its uses: 'It’s a fast, beautiful and fun way to share your photos with friends and family. Snap a picture, choose a filter to transform its look and feel, then post to Instagram. Share to Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr too – it's as easy as pie. It's photo sharing, reinvented' (http://instagr.am/). I personally don't use Instagram, so I'm not sure that i can comment fairly on this topic seeing as I haven't trialed and tested the App. However, many friends of mine use it and love using it too. I think the only negative with applications like this is that there is a worry that Analogue will die out. In the debate someone raised an important issue, if, unlike us photography students (who have a good knowledge and understanding of the difference between analogue and digital) you don't have the understanding, then will people who don't have the same knowledge think that this App is an example of good photography? I take this point on board, and in some respects agree with it, however, it is possible to gain an understanding for analogue photography if willing to do so and the App could be a starting point?...

My visit to Yayoi Kusama's exhibition. Tate Mordern.

Yayoi Kusama 'The Passing Winter'
Image taken from: roslynoxley9.com.au

I was fortunate enough to be able to go and see Yayoi Kusama's exhibition at the Tate Modern last weekend. After having read about her work on the Tate Channel and having done some research on her, I was really keen to actually see her work in person. The exhibition is a series of “immersive environments” designed to take us through the phases of Kusama’s career. Her dot designs are seen on balloons in the foyer, but not in the exhibition itself, and a recent installation of a darkened sitting-room covered in fluorescent dots feels like a rather tame reprise of something that would have had more bite in the Sixties. The final room of the exhibition was one of her light installations, the mirrored coloured lightbulbs  made for a magical viewing. Kusama's work evidents her physcological struggle.