CHILDREN PHOTOGRAPHY STUDY OF THE VIVIAN MAIER STREET PHOTOGRAPHY : A HERMENEUTIC APPROACH
Children's photography in this era has experienced a shift in meaning. It is deprived of its context and is more functioned as an object of 'property', a construction of good family identity. Parents who take pictures of their children are more oriented to get positive responses from...
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| Format: | Theses |
| Language: | Indonesia |
| Online Access: | https://digilib.itb.ac.id/gdl/view/44067 |
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| Institution: | Institut Teknologi Bandung |
| Language: | Indonesia |
| Summary: | Children's photography in this era has experienced a shift in meaning. It is deprived of its context and is more functioned as an object of 'property', a construction of good family identity. Parents who take pictures of their children are more oriented to get positive responses from others through Instagram. At least this has led to a new paradigm of subjectivity that forms certain compositions in children's photographs. But Vivian Maier seems to be different because she is in a different context. Maier is assumed to work in the field of photography without degrading the child.
Vivivan Maier (1926-2009) herself was a nanny and photographer. She never published her work (more than 100,000 negative photos) during her life until she died in 2009. The events of the discovery of Vivian Maier's photographic work became an interesting finding for the world of photography when the photos in Vivian Maier's work were never revealed during her life . Vivian Maier captures a lot of moments around her, and she is considered street photography by presenting good photography techniques. Although Vivian Maier is known as a world-class photographer after the discovery of her work in 2009 by John Maloof, the results of Vivian Maier's photos have not been much used as research topics as a form of appreciation.
This study aims to interpret the meaning in Vivian Maier's photographic works. In addition, this study also aims to examine in depth the relationship between how Vivian Maier's thoughts with his photography work. This aspect of thinking can be obtained through the method of biographical description and psychoanalysis. The object in this study is Vivian Maier's photographic work published by John Maloof as the current owner of the assets of Vivian Maier's.
The methodology used in this research is descriptive qualitative: understanding aesthetic aspects through non-technical studies of photos to the level of meaning through a hermeneutic perspective. Data collection is obtained both through digital data and available texts. The first step in data retrieval is to explore the description of life and context of the Vivian Maier era. A literature review is needed to clearly position Vivian Maier's research position. Second step, collecting data in the form of Vivian Maier's photographic works published by John Mallof. The third step is
to examine the data creation of the work. Photo analysis can be viewed from non-technical aspects, which are closer to the study of formalism. This emphasizes more on the visual aspect rather than the narrative context. Study of non technical aspects in photography includes, (1) composition, (2) photo format, (3) background (foreground, midground and background), (4) distance of taking, (5) angle of capture, (6) visual dimension, ( 7) tone, and (8) substance. As for the point of photo substance, it can be expanded in the aspect of metaphors and text symbols with the referential aspects of the photographer's biography. Fifth, the final step is the process of interpreting meaning in Vivian Maier's photographic work using a hermeneutic perspective. Hermeneutics is used as the main approach to find new meaning in the process of re-contextualization of children's photographs by Vivian Maier.
Through this research, a new meaning is obtained including the problem of child photography banality in the context of street photography, which saves seriousness. The issue of moment becomes important because the object is a stranger and is not a child of his own or a child close to Maier. So that the moment will not be repeated and cannot be reconstructed like in the current photo shoot on Instagram. The next issue is the problem of identity construction that is presented in each photo oriented sharing on Instagram. In family photos that are shared on Instagram as much as possible to avoid the moments that memorable "bad" such as violence and so forth. It is precisely Vivian Maier in the photo, presenting the impression of strength, power relations, 'symbolic' violence that arises. This can be interpreted as "honesty" over the real conditions in the post World War II era. This is reflected in the photos of children who at least display the conditions of the era, environment and culture in which she lives.
Vivian Maier emphasizes the aesthetic rules in photography, in addition to subject matter in the framing process also through subjectivity that appears in photographs. This is clear evidence of a fundamental difference regarding the problem of the banality of the moment which becomes a paradigm shift in photography described above. In the end, the meaning of children in Maier's photo is an existential meaning that represents his presence that is close to the child's world, memory representation of personal experiences while caring for children and the value of honesty that he upholds in the rules of street photography |
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