Behind the Flashlight–Jelena Xu
—Concept—
With this project, I want to express the “aesthetic gaze” and the consequent “beauty anxiety”. Photography has always been a way to capture the beauty. But sometimes, photo is no longer a record of beauty but a source of anxiety. When we go to social media platforms, we can often find the home page filled with beautiful, well-groomed, and delicate pictures of similar styles. At the same time, many people also fall into anxiety and self-doubt because of the judgment from others. I want to emphasize that when beauty becomes a burden and a yoke, bringing anxiety, self-doubt, staring and confrontation, it is time to stop and think about the true meaning of beauty.
Regarding the connection between the two images, I wanted to create a contrasting relationship between them. The collage shows the truth behind the photographs that is not easily perceived at first glance but is really there.
Specifically for this piece, the photograph part records a scene that has been exquisitely dressed and designed. It looks clean and decent, so exquisite that it even has a hint of flattery. In contrast, the collage part shows the kind of beauty that is suffocating and distorted behind the flashlight . It has a cluttered background where all images are covered with layers of camouflage; where all accessories are transformed into shackles, making it feel impossible to breathe. I hope to use this work to inspire people to rethink the meaning of photography, which should be used to record the beautiful moments in life, which should be real, happy and meaningful, instead of changing oneself to meet certain aesthetics or trends, or even becoming a puppet of “beauty”.
—Process—
PART I: Photograph
Due to the epidemic control, I couldn’t go out to shoot, so I decided to build an indoor installation.
The first thing I did was to create a background. I chose to use crumpled and unfolded tin foil along colored cloth together to complete a grid-like background.
I originally wanted to reproduce my work from the Color&Atmosphere project with paint, but I found that it was not as easy to paint the surface of the cloth as I thought it would be, and there were size limitations that prevented many details from being rendered. So I ended up just following the design and concept from the previous project and painting these four cloths. These will be used as backgrounds to represent different styles of dress and scenes.
Then I put different flowers with dried flowers on the grid of tinfoil for representing different people. Each grid has a correspondence with the pattern on the cloth next to it (color&shape).
The final installment👇
Since I was shooting at home, the lights in my room were warm and there was a lack of lighting equipment, so the photo took on a strange tone, but I toned it down in post using the white balance function in ps. Also, due to the quality of my camera, the panorama was always partially out of focus. I tried shooting parts of this installation from different angles, but none of them worked very well and I’m still looking for better solution.
Some of my tries👇
I finally chose this picture as the photography part for my first version,
I changed the white balance so it finally looks like this👇
PART II：Collage
In this part, I still chose to use flowers as the main element, and added the elements of studs and chains to correspond to the elements of the necklace and earrings in the first part.Because I couldn’t find a real silver chain, I tore the tinfoil into small strips and twisted them together to form the shape of a chain.I photographed different shapes of chains, which will become the main connecting part of my images.
The bottom right corner of the image consists of two red magenta peonies, and I transformed all the branches into chains to express the bondage. At the same time, I was inspired by the plastic cling film on the vegetables and wanted to create a feeling that the flowers were tightly wrapped in plastic and could not breathe. Using the mask function and changing the transparency of the tin I photographed to give it a translucent plastic effect.
I wanted to emphasize the flower in the far corner, I took off a few petals and replaced them with a chain to express the phenomenon of over-alteration to suit the “beauty standard”.
The rest of the picture is made up of flowers made of pins. I also used the mask function on some combinations to create a sense of fragility and add harmony to the image.At the same time, I replaced one of the caps of the nails with a locking chain in each combination.
Some of the Original Photos👇
—Conclusion—
If I had more time, I would probably look for a photograph that would make my entire installation manifest and strengthen the connection between the two parts. For example, at the moment I am working mainly with symbolic elements such as flowers, cloth, nails and chains. But if I could find a better connection to summarize these elements and use it as a link between the two parts, it might help my work become more self-explanatory and strengthen my expression.
—Image & Contact Sheet—
