Mathilde-project proposal

INTIMACY * EMOTIONS * MEMORIES  

A study on slice of life photography and conveying nostalgia

What do you want to make?

In my previous work I’ve experimented a lot with creating cinematic scenes, almost like a screenshot out of a movie. I created this with the ultimate goal of this particular analysis but at a stage where it had no actual narrative depth.

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  Earlier Work 1

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  Earlier Work 2

Key to my work will be the subject of memory; I would like to recreate moments of intimacy that provoke emotion. I want this work to have a slice of life element to them; universally relatable, specific moments that we all share. These memories will be shot and composed in the way that remember them; fragments and details of a moment that comprise a story together.

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  Example of the "memory"

I will start with intimate moments I, myself am experiencing first; for example lying in bed with my partner. The photographs will be intimate compositions of details that fix in the memory, arranged in ways to create a narrative that conveys emotion. In this experiment I have taken several images and rearranged them to give them a narrative like above. This is the foundation that I want to build on in my project, exploring more within the realm of intimacy starting with myself as a way of warming up to these intimate compositions.

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  My first try at a "memory"

I want to draw on the visual language of cinema, such as 80s Asian cinema. These have a particular colour range; a yellow-greenish, mostly warm toned aesthetic with a high contrast and yet a softness to them. I will also draw on the influence of asian analog photographers who use a similar aesthetic of this grainy, green toned, nostalgic aesthetic. With this style, I want these images to put the viewer in a particular nostalgic place.

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  Example 1

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  Example 2

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  Example 3

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  Example 4

These images will be shot digitally and colour graded and lit to have an analogue and cinematic blend style. This promotes, to me, the best of both worlds; combining my digital shooting method with the style and nostalgia of an analog look. I want these photographs to have a feeling of being a quick snapshot while at the same time being a little too dreamy and stylised to create the feeling of it being a memory that is romanticised.

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  Analog style study 1

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  Analog style study 2

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  Cinematic Style study 2

Why do you want to make it?

I have always been moved by slice of life type images, there is something poetic about a piece of artwork that shows you a normal everyday scenario that you are not a part of and can still give that feeling of nostalgia. It gives me a feeling of now-ness while never actually having experienced that particular moment. Examples of these kinds of moments in the movie Totoro below, in which a an absolutely mundane moment is captured, while still giving off a wholesomeness of of relatable moment.

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  Ghibli gif 1

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  Ghibli gif 2

Relation to a larger context

This project will be my contribution to the slice of life style art. Below some more screenshots of the movie Minari, which is about a Korean family in America that struggles to life off of a new farm they just moved to. While it's not spectacular in the same way that action movies are, and even though not everyone suffers the exact same struggles as they do; there is still a relatability in the way that the family is trying to keep afloat together, while still finding small hopeful moments in each other.

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  Minari 1

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  Minari 2

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  Minari 3

Timetable

Okt-Nov

• Shoots with models - main focus on developing analog style, composition experiments.
• My own intimate moments - Main focus on composition.

Dec-Jan

• Shoots with models - Combine composition and style
• Dabble with narrative: what works and what doesn't?

Jan-???

• The work as a result of these experiments.
• conclusions
• Thesis deadline

References/bibliography

• In the mood for love (2000)
• Minari (2021)
• My neighbour Totoro (1988)
• Sideways (2004)
• The Power of Now - Echkart Tolle

I choose these movies as my references because some of them have a very slice of life element to them. Scenic/cinematographic and story wise I feel like they can have a relatability to different types of people because they can be interpreted in your own way, while still having a concrete idea of what is happening.