The Selfie
What I know so far: A selfie is a picture of yourself/a self portrait. The origins of the selfie dates back to around 1839 but has become more and more popular over the last few years because of cameras on phones and because its so easy to upload the images to social media. Billions of selfies are posted on the internet every year. Before cameras though self portraits where made using paint.
The actual definition of selfie: "a picture taken of yourself usually with a phone camera or webcam and uploading it to social media."
Vivian Maier
Vivian Maier was an American street photographer born in 1926. Her work was not recognized until after her death in 2009 when she was 83. During her life she was a nanny for various different families, travelled the world and documented her life using pictures. In an auction her photos where sold to a man named Ron Slattery who posted them onto the internet in 2008. First they failed to get any recognition but soon got the fame they deserved. People call her the secret photographer as no-one, not even the family she worked for, knew she took pictures until after her death and she took pictures of strangers on the street without them knowing.
Here are some examples of her work:
My Vivian Maier exhibition
If I was tasked to make an exhibition then this is what I would do:
To start off with I would call it "Vivian Maier; the secret photographer" The exhibition would be a collection of her black and white photos and they would be laid out so that they spell the letters of her name. There would also be information points laid out around the room. The idea of the exhibition would be to show everyone Vivian's work and the story of her life.
To start off with I would call it "Vivian Maier; the secret photographer" The exhibition would be a collection of her black and white photos and they would be laid out so that they spell the letters of her name. There would also be information points laid out around the room. The idea of the exhibition would be to show everyone Vivian's work and the story of her life.
My Own Vivian Maier inspired images...
The next step in out project was to take some pictures inspired by Vivian Maier, this is how mine came out.
The video above is about the differences between selfies and self portraits and the different perceptions on the two ideas. Personally I think self portraits are more professional than selfies. Selfies are more to remember things and have fun, where as self portraits are more in depth which is what people say in the video.
This video is about the lack of representation of ethnic minorities in the pieces of work in the National Portrait Gallery. She speaks about pictures by some artists that do represent ethnic minorities for example images by Grace Lau