Laurence Demaison

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Laurence Demaison is a French photographer and artist. In many of the photographs above she uses a combination of her drawings in her photography to manipulate it. An aim of hers is to capture what a camera can see, which can't be seen with the human eye. Therefore in many of her photographs, she exposes the photograph over a period of time, creatinga ghostly effect.During her early career, Demaison wasparticularly interested in the female portrait and nude, but found it difficult to convey her 'mental images into words and direction', soon after she gave up on models and began to use herself as the subject of her photographs. However Demaison soon found out she struggled using her physical body to photograph, so she started experimenting destroyingher bodyand recreating it, leaving the outcome of mostly, dark sinister ghostly photographs. Bill Brandt was a British photographer (born in Germany) who was most famously known for capturing British life in the 20th century. Brandt's work stood out to me, by the way he manipulates the a section of the body, to link with the location the image was taken. From these images of his below, I realise that many of his images are taken from a low angle, sometimes floor level. I'm interested that he decided to take the majority of these images outside, using natural light and a wide-angled camera. This would be quite technically difficult as most of these pictures at the beach were taken whilst it was raining and windy, however it looks as though, they were taken during sunny weather, because of the high contrasts in the images. I think I will find it harder to rely on natural light, as the weather is mostly cloudy. I would like to experiment using both natural and artificial light, to refine down my ideas and style of images. A solution to the weather problem would be to just use the flash, to really emphasise the tones, textures and shapes of the body. From the 1940's Brandt completely changed his style of photography, from capturing post-WW2 to the female body. Autodidacte, Marc Sommer élabore depuis de nombreuses années, sans jamais la montrer, une oeuvre d’une grande cohérence, au fil de l’absurde. Dans ce travail photographique où la réalité est inventée de toutes pièces et orchestrée avec ses proches, des objets surréalistes côtoient des personnages mis en scènes. Complètement inédit, ce travail remarquable décrit un univers paradoxal, où une grande fantaisie accompagne un humour cruel et inattendu.

During the summer holidays I went up to Belford with a couple of my friends. I had originally planned to capture some more long exposure images with a variety of landscape settings, however I found that the majority of images I took were of landscapes, or nature using a normal shutter speed. Once I started getting drawn to these types of images, as I liked the stillness of the image and the calm feeling that came across when I looked through a few pictures.

Arachnophobia (fear of spiders)

Since the 1990s, the photographs of Laurence Demaison have gone beyond the genre of self-portrait to offer a deeply original vision that is at once multi-faceted and coherent. Although for many artists the representation of the self remains a sublime reflection of the author, here Demaison deforms her body and face, creating an otherness that conceals her true image. There’s a Surrealist touch to these series, which bear comic titles reminding the viewer that it’s all an invention. The representation of the body is the source of a long process of experimentation. Demaison draws on the technical possibilities of film, playing with exposure times, the focus, the contrast and the negative to create fascinating and singular images. I took these set of images each time I gave one of my dogs a treat. I think that these images are quite amusing mainly from the angle at which all the images were taken. From the high birds eye angle each time my dogs would wait for their treat, they would look up at the treat, which meant that the artificial lighting in the room would create a reflection in their eyes. From this and the way the dogs were sitting, it created a very innocent feeling towards the dogs. One way I could have improved these images, would have been by including the food for the dogs in the image, to make it more obvious what the dogs were looking at, as well as this I think by including the dog food it would've made the images more comedic as the viewers would be able to see what the dogs were staring at. Throughout this course we have been given a chance to add on coursework we may have missed. For me, I thought that it would be good to revisit some of my writing a year later and date it here, which will further show my improvement within this course. However, on saying this, i am going to leave my year ten coursework due to the reasoning my writing has improved. So below is a short write up continuing from my artist investigation - Laurence Demaision. Photographe autodidacte, Marc Sommer élabore ainsi depuis plusieurs années et sans la montrer jusqu’à présent, une oeuvre où les objets inventés côtoient les mises en scènes de personnages, souvent ses proches mis à contribution. Complètement inédit, ce travail étonnant décrit un univers paradoxal, d’une grande fantaisie mais à l’humour cruel et inattendu.

Ces dernières années, Laurence Demaison oriente ses recherches vers une démarche plasticienne, expose ses dessins et conçoit des sculptures dans un univers proche des séries photographiques qui l’ont fait connaitre. Elle s’autorise l’utilisation de mannequins comme modèles de ses photographies, ce qui lui permet de dépasser les limites de l’autoportrait et de concevoir des mises en scènes spectaculaires. Avec une maitrise totale du noir et blanc, de la prise de vue au tirage, la photographe joue avec les limites du medium comme dans ses monotypes, autoportraits directs au flash métamorphosés en épreuves uniques et lumineuses. Pour cette exposition, la photographe a sélectionné des travaux récents et des tirages de ce qu’elle appelle ses "petits parachutes", ébauches de séries ou prises de vues isolées dont elle a redécouvert les négatifs. I remember that after the call, I didn’t know what to do, so I took a long, hot bath. But it didn’t last too long—there was work to do! The HSBC team is incredibly efficient and competent and kind. It was such a pleasure to work with them in such wonderful and professional conditions. Such conditions are rare. I’d like to take this opportunity to thank them again and again.. I believe the majority of my work below shows the extent of my improvement with image analysis etc so this is the only thing i will be adding on to. There are many things i love about the pieces i have displayed above, in this mini paragraph i am going to go into some detail about the techniques this artist uses and how and what techniques i am trying to have as inspiration and will attempt to use within my shoot. For example, I would want to use a wide range of expertise within my composition ranges and style to create differentiation, I would only slightly alter my angles and perspectives just like laurence does as it distorts the image enough without unusual camera perspectives. Just above i will be taking and using multiple photos so i can see if any happy accidents occur or to have a wide scope of images of all variety so i can further edit them which leads well to concluding images and for me to know what worked well and what became faliures.From a strictly imagistic standpoint, Demaison approaches the process of photographic picture-making as an occasion for extraordinary formal invention. From a conceptual standpoint, she treats the photographic negative (and the resulting print) as a stage for the performance of an action invisible to the eye, often one of considerable duration by conventional standards.” Armed with poetry and humour, Laurence Demaison questions reality and plays with violence and passion about her life score. The only master on board is with her naked body that she defies the elements and that she questions the origins. It is obvious. Understand who can, she traces alone, leads and conducts herself in the meanders of existence. And so much for the Rain (“Pluies”). I aim to produce portraits that are elegant, beautiful, mysterious and sometimes strange.To show development, I must be able to purvey photos in a high quality standard. To begin my journey, I will consider a plan containing my key ideas such as what facial feature I would to cover with the mirror. I will then begin my in depth research on my artist research and give a detailed analysis as I would like to come up with multiple ideas for my final outcomes. The title of this image is 'A Jewish giant at home with his parents', I think her attraction to this subject, was to focus on 'outsiders' and to focus on their abnormalities. I think Arbus takes a photograph to how the world is and just captures things in the moment, but with this image the body language of the parents and their positioning feels quite staged. This is why I dislike the image, I think Arbus purposefully photographed this way, so it wouldn't come across as though she was exploiting her subjects. The body, given its formidable expressive power and unending versatility, is an inexhaustible and deeply engaging subject. And when we use our own body, it is capable of responding instantaneously and with minute accuracy to the ever-changing action/reaction that modulates the flow of conception, without the losses in transmission inherent in the use of a model." - Miguel Ribeiro ( http://www.miguelribeirophoto.com/video.html )

The Indian saint Ramana Maharshi achieved enlightenment by asking “Who am I?” over and over. Demaison asks the same question, but not in words. Meanwhile, her body changes and ages. Her photographs become a journal of inquiry.”Her technical virtuosity leads us to art that revels in the extremes of visual perception. Demaison’s photographs remind me of the distortions of Kertesz, the inventive playfulness of Man Ray and Moholy-Nagy, and the multiple perspectives of the Cubists — but her work is clearly her own. The complexity and ambiguity of Laurence Demaison’s work intrigues me. Her work is made up of self portraits, all of which her identity is stripped. She tells stories, evokes emotion, and forms an image of a being that is distorted, beautiful, repulsed, praised, and everything in between. She has the ability to make many out of one form, which is an idea I would like to continue with. A lot of the ideas that I wish to work with are personal, and yet I have not been able to find a way to make it objective. Demaison has successfully removed her personal identity from her work, while still allowing her ideas to flow through. Some of her work is beautiful, while other pieces are frightful, and evocative. I would like to experiment with creating images in a way that Demaison does, and possibly solidifying them on metal to tell a story that what has been done cannot be changed, yet all emotions and events create the being that you are today.