Directions - self portraiture research

RESEARCH for idea generation and FORMAT

I started my research by watching and examining several different video-based self portraits,(below are my favorites) each of the videos below are described as self portraits. each one shows a different aspect of the concept, a different idea of what a video based self-portrait is.

SHORT films:

this one is fairly straight forward, it shows the life of the subject, using their living space as basis for this,through their possessions we may know them. this idea is the most similar to my first thoughts on the subject, something visually defining, a montage of different aspects to ones self.

this one is slightly more interesting, the subject uses a style like an expressionist artist, fiddling with sound and vision while still maintaining the central themes of the one above, I enjoy its experimental style, it feels like an A/V experiment, the musical experimentation effects the visual fiercely, it exhibitions something more than the last, it shows the subject's experimental attitude to work, their work spaces and even expresses their life in its short but clear scenes.

All below cannot be embedded properly or at all.

Noel Fielding's self portrait - the guardian


in this short, the subject uses his image as seen by a camera to digitally sketch a self portrait, the camera is rolling and we get to see his mind in action as he produces the art, this visualizes his thoughts in a way that a non-motion-picture self portrait cant, it shows his comments as he works, it visualizes his creative process and allows us to see how he see's himself.

Self Portrait - Memory With sound

this short shows a side of the subject that an audience is unused to seeing, it shows her underneath everything, underneath social or object related facets of herself, it shows her bare, in black and white, it shows her hidden vulnerability. it expresses reality through a dark and dirty filter. it shows her cut back to the bones. this one i find interesting because it sends a realist message through a filter of unreality, its realism but also exaggerated, it makes things feel too real, too small in some ways.

Self Portrait: A film by Max R. A. FEDORE

this film i enjoy because of its use of stock footage, and its narrator, i dont enjoy the tone as it seems rather morose, this is caused by the deliberately unreliable narrator's tone of voice, he seems to be producing a deep yet dark tone, his talking point is all about how our individual truths are more important than facts, he explains his life view, his personal truth and his story throughout. this film makes me stop and think about my own timeline of events, and will probably influence the style, if not tone of my own self portrait.

STILL images:

Secondly I examined a number of different still self portraits, I used numerous sources, much of this section is in relation to my fascination with the artist Bryan Lewis Saunders' collection "under the influence", the rest of this section is reserved for interesting self portraits that i found while searching.

Bryan Lewis Saunders
LINK to collection HERE!!



"After experiencing drastic changes in my environment, I looked for other experiences that might profoundly affect my perception of self.  So I devised another experiment where everyday I took a different drug or intoxicant and drew myself under the influence."  - Bryan Lewis Saunders

This collection is interesting and a source of inspiration for me, it explores the sense of self through different filters, all of which are exterior, feelings and expressions created by the psyche while inebriated in different ways, from a purely scientific point of view it allows the audience to see the subject as seen through a mind changed by chemical introduction, from an artistic point of view it allows us to see how his sense of identity is changed by the substances taken, how different parts of his psyche leak onto the page dependent on the substance.

personally this collection made me stop and examine myself when i first looked through it , how i am sober, how i am drunk, how I represent myself in different environments, admittedly i self reflect often enough anyway, often this is unfortunate as i tend to feel a low sense of worth, HOWEVER this collection made me think of how i am in different social situations, rather than merely alone and has influenced my ideas in relation to how i want to translate my "self" onto the screen.

interestingly vague self portraits

the following images I feel represent interesting ideas through still's, they are all self portraits, but all say different things about their subjects, i found them likable and interesting in their designs.

No.1

No.2

No.3

No.4

No.5

FURTHUR exterior research

my final piece of externalized research is in relation to interesting content, stuff that i might use in my self portrait, things like old photos and documents from my past, but also thing in relation to media that is within the public domain, stock footage to use etc, the two below are royalty free and i hope to use them as visual metaphors at some point. the documents and old photos are with my parents and will be scanned and sent to me when needed.