Photography for Artists & Designers

Art & Design 265: Project

 

Project: Photo Flaneur

Week: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | Schedule

Prep

Read Baudelaire's essay The Painter of Modern Life.

Though Baudelaire was writing at the dawn of the photographic era, and though he refers, particularly to painting rather than to photography, his comments apply to image-makers in any medium. He is exploring how we look, how we find subject matter and how we respond to those stimuli.

Review some of the photography by those interested in the concept and the attitude of the flâneur.
( Le Flâneur | FlaneurPhoto | UrbanPhoto | McGuire | )

Process

Select a place or area in which to wander and shoot images in this attitude and graphic style.

You might pick a common, peopled place like a coffee shop, the Student Center, the dining hall or campus sidewalks between classes or after chapel.

To be a flaneur you must not so much have a plan, as an attitude of wandering, exploring, observing — its is to be both attentive and undirected. You are directed by what you discover, not by a plan or an objective.
Recall Tolkien's All who wander are not lost.    That's about right.

Now, see what you see.
Discover what is to be discovered.
Attempt to capture your curiousities in images so you can share your aha's with the rest of us.

You may discover a theme consciously as you shoot.
You may not discover any theme until you are editing and selecting from your images.
There may be no thematic unity in your images except sustained diversity.

Required

Shoot at least 50 images.
Select (at least) 20 of those for editing.
Select 7 of those for G+ presentation.

Downsize images to 4Mpix JPGs before upload.

Post to G+ :
Project Photo Album: 020_PhotoFlaneur

Sub-Album/Folder: Roughs (30+ images)
Sub-Album/Folder: Edited (13+ images)
Sub-Album/Folder: Final Series (7 images)

Write an artists statement for the final series.
— Discuss whatever theme or emphases you discovered. You might describe what you found as you flaneured about. What surprised you? How did your direction change as you went?

Write critical comments about the final series images:
— Discuss the strengths of the final images in relation to that theme.

Next Class:
Draft version of images uploaded by 8am
Critique classmates works by 4pm

Following Class:
Final version of your series uploaded to G+

 

 

Course Home Page