Guardian pull-out of pop stars

I’ll use this set of photos to compare progress of how the course concepts may apply. They were given away by the Guardian in June 2011, and taken by famous photographers such as Jan Bown and Nadav Kander.

What makes them special?

Adele hides under a sheet looking afraid, and vulnerable. Is she making a statement that here body is less important than her voice? I wonder who decided on this setting – Adele, Sturrock, an art director, or Adele’s ‘people’? Great photo, and I particularly like her wild hair. She’s looking directly into the lens of Alex Sturrock, and the choice of environment is quite different.

This is Lily Allen captured by Nadav Kander, South African landscape and portrait specialist. The photo has a yellow background and Allen has quite a yellowish hue, which produces a strange image, almost photographically “faulty”. I prefer his portrait for the National Portrait Gallery in which Allen is looking coquetishly at the camera wheras here she seems ill.  http://stocklandmartelblog.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/nadav-kander-lilly-allen.jpg

 Thom Yoke is shot here by Tom Sheehan. Again there is no environment to distract, only the person is to be considered.  Yorke had surgery several times on an eye which left him with a “drooping eyelid” for which he was teased as schoolboy. His band Radiohead have produced some very dark songs, one of which was used in a Father Ted episode where a priest hears the tune and becomes vey depressed. Yorke apparently does not mix well socially and despises the music business. So this photo could be Sheehan’s interpretation of Yorke’s overall condition, where Yorke hides his eye and cannot make eye contact. Sheehan’s business is capturing rock musicians.

 PJ Harvey by Jane Bown, noted Guardian photographer. PJ is more usually photographed by her friend Maria Mochnacz who has a quite creative style, often capturing her subjects headless or on plastic cameras. Bown is more predictable photographer, producing reliable images of her subjects, which I guess is what the Observer needed for this shoot. (Sidenote – Bown is represented by the Topfoto Gallery in Kent to which i was invited for a tour last year. Amazing image library, and I’ll post my brief report on that even though I’ve already metioned this for TAoP.)

This photo is quite deadpan and expressionless, which might suggest that Bown had a strained rapport with PJ but her friend Maria also captured mostly expressionless shots, as seen in her gallery- http://www.mariamochnacz.co.uk/pjharvey/00pjharvey.asp

 This merry band are Take That by Chris Floyd. Floyd  is an interesting portrait photographer, frequently putting his subjects in a relevant environment, such as this where the band seem be surrounded by props related to entertainment. He has quite a fresh take on his subjects even when backgrounds are removed, such as when he takes  multiple image shot of comedian Michael Macintyre. I’m tempted to see this as a little “showy” but Chris makes a commercial living from it. I’ll return to Floyd’s work as I work through the course.   http://www.chrisfloyd.com/#a=0&at=0&mi=1&pt=0&pi=1&s=31&p=-1

 Next up is Elton John by Val Wilmer, taken in 1968. I have an interest in this because I also took photos of Elton in 1983 when I worked at Sun City and took photos part time for the in-house magazine. My photos were taken off me by the management because they showed Elton at a very low point in his career, barely able  to walk let alone play piano and perform to a large crowd. This image was his first photo-shoot as a musician taken before his drug problems and he appears relatively conventional by sixties norms. There’s countryside shown behind him (Hampstead Heath), and today that would probably be on his own estate. Wilmer also specialises in photos of musicians.

 Dizzee Rascal by Desmond Muckian. Bare-chested, staring straight at the camera and the expression a mixture of menace and inquisitiveness depending which eye you look at. This type of photo is invaluable for studying the subject, where in real life you’d look away very quickly.  Muckian has a very direct style and distinctive lighting in his work. http://www.desmondmuckian.com/music.html

 Another image by Jane Bown, this time of Paul McCartney and Gorge apparently taken unawares in their dressing room.  They were maybe so aware of Bown that they started to ignore her and thus she was able to take this intimate portrait.

  Patti Smith taken head on with wind in her hair by Tricia de Courcy Ling. This shot is quite different from those on Courcy Ling’s website, although it was commissioned by the Guardian which may hve a style guide for their photographers. Smith was notably also a model for Robert Mapplethorpe and has lead quite an interesting life, being immersed in the world of celebrity through Mapplethorpe in the Chelsea Hotel in New York. Now aged 61 you can imagine the life she’s had through this image.

 Lastly Morrissey by Perou. He comes across as quite a depressing figure, and Perou has positioned him within a fairly depressing environment, looking away from the camera. Few of Perou’s subjects seem especially happy. Perhaps this is Perou’s persona – too cool to show empathy? His (her?) style is distinctive and interesting and Morrissey has been captured  in a such way as that would probably approve.