Project Brief 2: The Social Role of Family Portraiture – Post 1
Family photography is for the people whom are not in the pictures.
Memory does not provide perfect recall and since the necessary technology was developed, humans have been documenting their lives in an attempt to record their own history. It is the consensus of a society that defines the past and this can be seen even on the micro-scale of personal videography and photography. “The temporal shifting that occurs during filmmaking includes the filmmaker’s projection of how future generations and perhaps anonymous viewers will see and judge the contents of the film” (Bevan, 2012, pg. 549). An example that is explored in Bevan’s article is the family film and its role in the television show Mad Men. The video piece I created attempts to explore the position family portraiture and photography has in a social context.
Old media generations placed a prestige on photography as it granted visual proof of past moments and allowed for the people who did not experience the events to understand what they missed. The long-established cultural practice of family photographs has changed as it entered the post-modern world. With the introduction of the internet and social media, family photos have pivoted from merely being “framed and displayed in the home, kept in wallets or presented as a series of pictures in photo albums” (Pauwels, 2008, pg. 34). The social media injection into photography is one of instant sharing, posting online for everyone to see. The link between the old and new media approach to personal photography is the desire to share these images with other friends and family, whether it be in a photo album or on Facebook. The image provides a conversational springboard to inform the outside viewer of the story behind the photo. “The notion of family time as rare and special has its roots in the late nineteenth century when the sort of ritualized family moments that have come to be called ‘quality family time’ became common among the growing middle class of Europe and North America” (Hallman & Benbow, 2007, pg. 873). The stature given to family portraits has created a sanctity around them, leading to a main goal of demonstrating the family’s nature through the image. “One of the most accepted notions about early photographic portraits is that their subjects either conformed to bourgeois ideals of materialistic display and “family values,” or they aspired to do so.” (Hudgins, 2010, pg. 560)
Instead of telling someone about the story behind the pictures shown in the video above, I thought to simply record the audio of the photoshoot to pull back the curtain in a unique way. I did not want to use video because it provides too much information and the visual element would turn into a more public artefact. By forcing the audience to imagine what the scene looks like, they must draw upon their memories of taking similar photos and the long process they have gone through to end up with a perfect family portrait.
Bibliography
Bevan, Alex (2012) ‘Nostalgia For Pre-Digital Media in Mad Men’ Television & New Media, vol. 14(6), pp. 546 – 559
Hallman, Bonnie & Benbow, S. Mary (2007) ‘Family Leisure, Family Photography and Zoos: Exploring the Emotional Geographies of Famillies’, Social and Cultural Geography, vol. 8(6), pp. 871 – 888
Hudgins, Nicole (2010) ‘A Historical Approach to Family Photography: Class and Individuality in Manchester and Lille, 1850-1914’ Journal of Social History, vol. 43(3), pp. 559 – 586
Pauwels, Luc (2008) ‘A Private Visual Practice Going Public? Social Functions and Sociological Research Opportunities of Web-based Family Photography’, Visual Studies, vol. 23(1), pp. 34 – 49
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