A childhood memory

It was easy to decide on a memory for this assignment; it’s talked about every time a child in our family gets tired of walking. It’s the day we made the Boggle Song.

Our holiday was a tour of several Bed & Breakfast establishments around the Scottish Highlands and as was often the case, much of our time was spent walking in the mountains. The youngest in the family, I sometimes tired before the others so needed much encouragement from my Mum.

The B&B we stayed on this particular day had given us a hearty fry up for breakfast, followed by more toast than we could eat on one of those silver toast racks that were considered quite posh back then. Unwilling to see food thrown away, my step-dad proceeded to spread them with marmalade and wrap them in napkins ‘for dinner’. I hated marmalade, I wished he’d just spread a couple with jam but I daren’t complain so we set out with me, dreading eating my lunch but looking forward to a day in the hills.

About half way up the mountain, my legs were aching; the grown ups had to get inventive. Somehow between them, they decided that my new walking boots were actually Boggle boots, a Boggle being an amazing creature that skims mountains with ease, all due to the Boggle magic in their boots. At this point, we made up the Boggle Song and sang it as we climbed, my aching legs being a thing of the past. To this day, none of us can remember anything apart from the first two lines:

‘I’m the first Boggle in the world,

 I’m the first Boggle in the world…

Thanks to my new boots and their Boggle magic, we reached the top of the mountain and a welcome dinner of cold toast marmalade sandwiches – it was a moment of mixed emotions…

Nigel Shafran

Nigel Shafran’s website is a hive of domesticity, mainly featuring household chores and shopping. His series, ‘Washing Up’ documents, as you might expect, his washing up from each day, stacked up on the draining board. Images were paired with accompanying text, stating what he ate that day. Shafran was interested in photographing something that constantly changed in structure and enjoyed the ever-changing light coming through the kitchen window.

Did it surprise you that this was taken by a man? Why?

This question amused me; I grew up in a very female household until I was nine years old. As a result of this, I had never experienced gender based family roles; my mum did everything. When she remarried, her very busy General Practitioner husband had much more defined opinions on gender roles, which sometimes caused tension.

He did enjoy cooking, although you wouldn’t want to eat it but didn’t feel that other housework was his domain. On the odd occasion that he felt like being a progressive husband, he would announce to everyone quite loudly, and usually when we had company, ‘I’ll do the washing up!’ Women would coo about what a good husband he was and when they left… he’d sit in front of the television and let us do the pots. With this experience, it is easy to see why I was quite amused by a man photographing his achievements in doing such a simple task. 

Having said that, I don’t think this was the purpose of Shafran’s project, it doesn’t even state who did the pots. He seems to have mainly been drawn to the ever-changing aesthetics.

In your opinion, does gender contribute to the creation of an image?

I think gender can contribute to the creation of an image but I don’t think it necessarily does. Our life experiences all combine to contribute to what we see and choose to photograph; our gender, race, culture, sexuality, disability among many other things can all be contributory factors… or they can be irrelevant. For some people, gender is a large part of who they are, for others it is unimportant.

What does this series achieve by not including people?

I feel that the lack of people in the series depersonalises it. The addition of people would make it feel like we were taking a peek at someone else’s life; their omission creates a setting that could easily belong to us, or someone we know. This could possibly make the viewer relate to it more readily. It also leaves the question unanswered, ‘Who did the washing up?’

Do you regard them as interesting still life compositions?

As a stand-alone image, I feel that any one of the photographs could possibly be thought of as a still life composition, however the pile of pots has not been created with aesthetics in mind, more that they were appreciated afterwards; the subject emerged as a result of living. I feel that the series as a whole removes even further from still life as more and more evidence of living occurs. The ever-evolving pile, the changing light and growing plants represent movement through life, far from still.

Having viewed other sets on Shafran’s website, I get the impression that his entire library is a self-portrait. This then leads to the question, ‘is this the same for us all?’

References:

Jobey L (2008), Photographer Nigel Shafran: domestic harmony [online] http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2008/oct/23/nigel-shafran (accessed 1/9/15)

Shafran N (2000), Nigel Shafran [online]. At http://nigelshafran.com/category/washing-up-2000-2000/(accessed 1/9/15)

Maria Kapajeva

Maria Kapajeva uses a self-absented approach to self-portraiture in her project ‘A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Woman’, using other women with whom she feels an affinity. The connection with most is through their shared experience in moving to another country to fulfil their potential in the arts, be it painting, writing, inventing; often escaping a widely held expectation to put the role of housewife before their career.

Kapajeva aims to show strength and individuality in these women, portraying each in her own working environment to further display their own personal story as an extension of her own. Although photographing other women, Kapajeva is projecting her own feelings about how it feels to be a woman in the world today. The strong, individual women photographed represent who she has enabled herself to become by moving away from her former life.

A work in progress, this fits with many of her past projects focussing on issues around women in society, career and marriage, arranged or otherwise. During a trip to India where marriage is considered very important, Kapajeva was constantly made aware of her single status. Rather than become self-conscious, she created a project, interviewing and photographing young, educated women who had reservations on arranged marriage. Fitting with the country’s tendency to hand paint photographs to make the family appear more affluent, Kapajeva used this technique on her portraits, leaving only the mirror reflection in black and white as a reference to the original image.

The series, ‘Interiors’ focuses on Russian women advertising themselves online for marriage, posing half naked in their homes in a bid to stand out and be noticed. Kapajeva’s manipulation of these images, covering their naked bodies with their own wallpaper promotes the concept that although they are trying hard to stand out, they are merely seen as a part of their domestic landscape, a wife, a mother, a housewife.

Kapajeva used these projects to bring together women of a similar bent, bringing solidarity to women who could otherwise feel isolated in their life choices; I am sure that many women viewing her work will feel that same affinity to Kapajeva and the women she has used in her work.

References:

Kapajeva M, Maria Kapajeva [online]. At http://www.mariakapajeva.com/a-portrait-of-the-artist-as-a-young-woman/ (accessed 1/9/15)

Boothroyd S. (2014) Maria Kapajeva [online]. At https://photoparley.wordpress.com/2014/05/13/maria-kapajeva/ (accessed 1/9/15)