essay about art
Artist Statement
When researching artists for the our previous project, “Seeing Light”, I chose to look at
Todd Hido’s project “homes at night” . The “homes at night” project involves pictures of houses 1
at night time in a small, quiet, town. While looking through these pictures, I couldn’t help but
want more. I searched for an eerie event to happen to or near these houses, but nothing ever
happened. With the guest lecture by Aspen Mays and her work with astronomers, I was inspired
to look up towards the sky and think about methods for taking pictures that were different from
styles that I had already worked with. Thanks to the creative freedom of this final project, I took
it upon myself to focus on creating a science-fiction based horror story satisfy my yearning for
more. Because I wanted to create a story, I chose to research movies of similar themes for
inspiration instead of still life photography. Through the use of long exposures and custom white
balances at night, I was able focus on light and create a cinematic universe that would help
reinforce the science-fiction theme.
The photography of Christian Hoiberg and their project with the Northern Lights was a
major inspiration for my final project . Hoiberg was able to capture the astrological event of the 2
Northern Lights through the use of long exposures, luck, and avoiding light pollution from cities.
The luck portion of their work comes into play because the visibility of the Northern Lights
1 Hido, Todd. Homes at Night
. Todd Hido
, www.toddhido.com/homes.html. Accessed 7 June 2018.
2 Hoiberg, Christian. Northern Lights
. Northern Lights
, www.choiberg.com/northern-lights/. Accessed 28
May 2018
depends heavily on the weather. The series on the Northern Lights inspired me to work with
different white balances in order to create vibrant colors in the sky. The weather is a huge factor
when trying to take night pictures, if it is overcast, with the proper white balance, one could
replace the grey sky with a unique color. My project tried to recreate the pictures of the Northern
Lights, without actually going to the Northern Lights, to create a world of fiction. Another factor
that I ran into was the amount of light pollution around any given city. While I was able to create
a greenish-blue sky in the middle of a field, far from a city, once I moved closer, my pictures
began to give off a yellow hue. The use of vibrant colors creates a sense of awe and wonder, key
emotions when discussing topics of space. The colors were a choice I made to help drive home
the cinematic and science-fiction theme in my photos. Another piece of work that I drew inspiration from was the movie Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem
Directed by The Brothers Strause and Cinematography by Daniel Pearl . The movie 3
gave me the idea for the content of the pictures and how to stick with the science-fiction horror
theme. The movie focuses on a small town located in the woods and goes through the events of a
horror film where locals stumble across a strange object in the woods and the horror portion
begins. As the film progresses, the characters do not see the alien that is attacking the locals until
it is too late. The monster’s kill count is attributed to its ability to be unseen and remain in the
shadows. From this movie, it helped me focus on light and distances to create a sense of curiosity
and surprise. My main objective was to keep the subject of a picture out of focus or not totally
understood to stimulate the audience’s interest. Through use of the local forrest and different
light sources, I was able to capture that sense of curiosity. I created a single light source in a dark
3 Strause, Colin, and Greg Strause, directors. Alien vs. Predator: Requiem
. 2007.
and mysterious forest that made those interested want to know more. In the sense of a horror
film, I would not reveal anything about the subject of my pictures. During the final shots, I
created an entity with the intent to scare the audience and trigger the fight or flight response. Continuing with the cinematic and science-fiction theme, I looked into Annihilation Directed by Alex Garland and with Cinematographer Rob Hardy . The movie has a portal that 4
consists of giant, vibrant, swirling colors that changes the environments that it contains. The
world outside of the portal is the standard world that an everyday person would see. While inside
the portal, animal and plant life are mutating rapidly creating alien creatures and plants that are
now vibrant with color. The horror aspect of the film stems from the new animal life that the
characters and audience don’t get a chance to see until someone has been attacked. The movie
helped me put emphasis on the horror aspect by not revealing anything until it’s too late to keep
the audience guessing. The movie depicts the normal world as dull with uses of greyed out color
schemes and depicts the world inside the portal with excessive use of rich colors taking over the
dull world. Rob Hardy’s work made me think about how to use white balance to create a sky or
scene with dynamic colors without the use of digital manipulation. The use of the portal also
helped give me an idea on how to deal with my struggles with light pollution. Since I was unable
to recreate the original color scheme after hours of trying, I had to find alternative methods to
deal with it. By incorporating a portal of my own, I was able to use pictures from multiple shoots
and attribute it to being in a different dimension. The idea, while not the most optimal choice,
had helped greatly when finalizing my project.
4 Garland, Alex, director. Annihilation
. 2018.
From a multitude of inspirations, I was able to create a series of photos that
communicated a horror story with a science-fiction feel. Without the wonderful guest lecture by
visiting artist Aspen Mays, I would not have thought to look up into the sky for a theme nor
would I have thought of taking pictures in non-traditional ways. Manipulating the white balance
to produce a vivid color spectrum came to mind when I was trying to make my pictures stand
out. The research on photographers like Todd Hido and Christian Hoiberg helped me develop the
initial ideas in taking pictures at night with interesting and glowing colors in order to create
unique pictures. The research on movies helped me develop the content of the series of pictures
and helped me develop a story and the right direction to follow. Through hard work and long