A critical reflection.

My brief

The readings, research and exercises should have led you to think about self portraiture in a variety of ways. Some practitioners deliberately play with ideas of fluidity and multiple selves, whilst still being anchored to a nominal self. Selfies, often used as self promotion, are intimately linked to their intended audience.

Create a series of six images of ‘you’ that show different ‘selves’.

Reflection

Before you send your work to your tutor, check it against the assessment criteria listed in the introduction to this course and make sure that it meets all the criteria.

Criterion

Demonstration of technical and visual skills: Materials, techniques, observational skills, visual awareness, design and compositional skills.

Quality of outcome: Content, application of knowledge, presentation of work in a coherent manner, discernment, conceptualisation of thoughts, communication of ideas.

Demonstration of creativity: Imagination, experimentation, invention, development of a personal voice.

Context: Reflection, research, critical thinking.

Criterion

From my research and exercises I thought about a portrait from the point-of-view of identity and the idea of multiple selves. The psychological aspect of identity and multiple selves was the subject that most interested me. As this was a project about me Shaun Mullins who is not a keen pro-active user of Facebook etc. and is not interested in self promotion, I looked towards the idea of multiple selves made from my past, present and even future selves.

throughout my project I was careful to control and manage my exposures and focus manually with the aid of studio lights, hand held incident light meter and tripod. For the black-and-white self portrait that I made for my present self I gave careful consideration to the mis-en-scene during the compositional process. For example the choice of location, elements within the shot and camera angle. I used studio lights either shone through a white umbrella or bounced off the ceiling to soften the light. I metered the lighting using a Sekonic incident light meter for accurate exposures and I also used a reflector for fill light in the shadowed areas.

Roland Barthes four image-repertoires and Pablo Picasso’s cubism both inspired my project. The artists such as Damian Hirst, Glen Brown, Sherrie Levine and Jeff Koons provided me with the idea to re-photograph some of my old photographs to represent my past selves and I believe that the choice and order of presentation of my pictures support the story of a journey through my life, that my project sets out to tell.

My cubist portrait was inspired by three paintings that I have on my wall and although I felt that I was taking a big risk to emulate them through a photographic collage, I am very happy with the outcome.

I believe that I have met the above criteria and I have really enjoyed this project.