The Pose
How can the pose be seen as a kind of performance or staging of self?
Figure 1
I think the pose can be seen as a kind of performance and staging of the self because of the way that person acts and wishes to be seen at that moment in time when the picture is taken.
In the image I have chosen colonel Gadhafi (FUGURE1) taken in 2009 during the U.N. general assembly by Platon an Englishman based in new york who’s worked for companies such as The New Yorker, Time Magazine, Rolling Stone, The New York Times Magazine and Vanity Fair. The subject to me comes across very serious, cultural, arrogant, powerful and important. The picture is also taken from an angle to make him seem bigger while he looks directly into the camera, which could come across confrontational or defiant if not both. All of this could be seen as a performance to get a certain message across in the image.
Barbara Bolt says, “ When we speak, write, draw take a photograph, construct a digital image or make a video, there seems little dispute that what we are involved in is making representations”(Bolt 2004:11). Which in this case a representation of ones self, “the pose” is a performance used to represent ones self. Gadhafi is representing himself as a serious leader of cultural being and understanding as and big fearless figure for the Libyan state.
John szarkowski says that there are “ those who think of photography as a means of self expression as a mirror, and those who think of it as a method of exploration as a window” (The rhetoric of the pose (photography and the portrait as performance). And with this image I think we are looking through a window the subject has created for us to look into and see what he wishes us to see at the time. And considering he is a notorious Libyan politician, revolutionary and dictator, who has led Libya since he overthrew King Idris in a 1969 coup and established the Libyan Arab Republic from Libya. I think for a person of his status and calibre it is
Figure 1
I think the pose can be seen as a kind of performance and staging of the self because of the way that person acts and wishes to be seen at that moment in time when the picture is taken.
In the image I have chosen colonel Gadhafi (FUGURE1) taken in 2009 during the U.N. general assembly by Platon an Englishman based in new york who’s worked for companies such as The New Yorker, Time Magazine, Rolling Stone, The New York Times Magazine and Vanity Fair. The subject to me comes across very serious, cultural, arrogant, powerful and important. The picture is also taken from an angle to make him seem bigger while he looks directly into the camera, which could come across confrontational or defiant if not both. All of this could be seen as a performance to get a certain message across in the image.
Barbara Bolt says, “ When we speak, write, draw take a photograph, construct a digital image or make a video, there seems little dispute that what we are involved in is making representations”(Bolt 2004:11). Which in this case a representation of ones self, “the pose” is a performance used to represent ones self. Gadhafi is representing himself as a serious leader of cultural being and understanding as and big fearless figure for the Libyan state.
John szarkowski says that there are “ those who think of photography as a means of self expression as a mirror, and those who think of it as a method of exploration as a window” (The rhetoric of the pose (photography and the portrait as performance). And with this image I think we are looking through a window the subject has created for us to look into and see what he wishes us to see at the time. And considering he is a notorious Libyan politician, revolutionary and dictator, who has led Libya since he overthrew King Idris in a 1969 coup and established the Libyan Arab Republic from Libya. I think for a person of his status and calibre it is
Bibliography: Bolt, Barbara. (2004) Art beyond representation: I.B. Tauris & co Ltd Malcolm morley (6/6/11) art of the 20th century. www.all-art.org (Accessed on 7/6/2011) Platon. (©2007-11) Platon. http://www.platonphoto.com/ (Accessed on 7/6/2011) The rhetoric of the pose (photography and the portrait as performance.) Witty, Patrick. (March 25, 2011) TIME Magazine: http://lightbox.time.com/2011/03/25/the-craziest-guy-in-the-room-a-portrait-of-gaddafi-by-platon/#1. (Accessed on 7/6/2011)