Research and proposal.

Research:
Browsing magnumphotos.com Jonas Bendiksen, Ian Berry and Raymond Depardon stuck out for me. These artists all utilized various techniques to enhance contrast.

Jonas Bendiksen made clever use of light, using not only brightness and shadows, but warmth to break up the image into more geometric shapes.

Reflections embellish the underlying black/white contrast, also hinting at metaphor in that the reflections only occur in the grave.

Bright glowing light acts as the source of the white foot prints, adding extra life and movement to the photo.

The warmth and clarity of the road creates heavy contrast with the cold colors and busy construction of the shacks.

Ian Berry uses more subtle contrast to highlight differences in ideas, or to provoke thought about the subjects. These photos often uses human subjects, contrasting their abstract features with other objects in the frame.

The escalators give a feeling of the process of travelling, combined with the human subjects causes the view to  ponder on their destination. The youths idle optimism and the elders weariness is an interesting counter point to the thin slice of buildings shown.

Similar to the first photo we have a contrast between the two subjects of this photo, the lower cases struggle vs the upper classes nonchalant stride.

Instead of a contrast, the lines in this photo give the impression that the old lady is traveling toward her death, in the likeness of crucified Christ. This link allows the viewer to extrapolate detailed feelings for the old lady, for the photo gives her the appearance of calm.

Raymond Depardon combines some of the above techniques to create abstract, almost simple, photography.

Both these image are similar to Jonas's work, using light to stylize the image and bring out the contrast. Instead of allowing this contrast to create interesting shapes, Raymond utilizes contrast to emphasize particular subjects, in these cases a line of camels and a parked car.

Comparing different subjects to one another and/or inanimate objects in a manor akin to Ian, Raymond draws the viewer into the moment. Once drawn in, this style of composition invites further consideration as to the depth of the relationships displayed.

Proposal:
Throughout wellington a number construction and deconstruction projects are underway. The aim of this project is to allow the viewer to see the contrast, in color, texture and shape, between areas and buildings which are being worked on. Furthermore, underlying this contrast is a relationship in time between buildings that are complete and those nearby that are not.

The contrast in color arises from differences in purpose. The bright oranges attract attention to inform, pale blue and whites mask the construction process whereas, the colors used elsewhere are generally more aesthetically pleasing.

The textures and shapes in construction are heavily utilitarian and repetitive in nature, whereas the shades in complete buildings are bold and unified.

*This proposal is a work in progress...