Reaction Paper #2

Rosanne Milano

Professor Cyr

Art 144

December 21^st , 2015

            The other day my class and I had the privilege to have Natan Dvir come and speak to our class about his work.  Dvir is an Israeli photographer based in New York. His work is based on cultural issues and personal conflicts from his own experiences.  His work tells a big story about the people in the images and what’s going on in the image. A lot of his work is about the lives of the people he is photographing, creating a lot of drama and also a connection with the people in the images. He’s actually spending some time and getting to know the people. In his “Shirat Hayam” project he spent about three months with the family and were total strangers, and by the end of his trip he was the last person to see that family eat their last meal in their home. He became so know and popular by the people living there many of them wanted to wait for Natan to photograph them for the last time in their homes. You could sense the connection he made with these people and the effect he had on them in his time there. While in another project of his called “eighteen” you do get some sort of connection to the person by their room and surroundings but they also had these very uninviting expressions on their face which makes it seems like they almost did not want him to take their photo. I also like how Natan explained what it takes and the benefits of pursuing three different types of styles of photography. He said never intended to be a photographer and had no idea what art was. But he somehow made it and is very happy he did. This is very inspirational to anyone who may doubt themselves not just with art but with anything they think they can’t achieve. You never know you’re good at something until you try it at least once.

Some Fun With Lights

These unfortunately didn't make it to the final cut but they were still fun to do. :)

Light Painting Portraits

This is part of my final project for the semester. I'm doing a series of portraits and incorporating different color lights. So far I have only shot one model but I am working on more ideas and techniques to use. I find this to be a lot of trial and error with what works and where the light is the brightest. I can't wait to see how this project turns out.

Paint in Water Part 3

I attempted this once again. I did use a different vase shape which I think helped a lot. Still haven't got this perfect yet but I'm still trying, still getting new ideas. There definitely is progress from my first attempt a few weeks back.I'm still amazed by all the different images that are created doing this project. No two images look exactly the same and that's part of what I love about it, each picture is unique to itself, but are also very similar.

Kings Park

This past weekend I took a trip to Kings Park to go to walk around the psychiatric center that use to run from 1885 to 1996. It's so fascinating that in almost 20 years these buildings are basically destroyed on the inside. Although the outside,beside from all the broken windows, are very much in tact. Nothing more of some graffiti and minor cracks from being old. I wish I had actually gone in to some of the buildings, there are many people who go on top of the roofs as well. I do enjoy how these two images came out. I like the lighting on the walls of the two rooms its very bright but also soft, then that last dark room which add an eerie feel to the image along with the debris everywhere and the ceiling that has fallen apart over the years. The bottom image was shot through what was a window that had metal bars over it. These building with the bars on the windows was where the criminally insane were kept I like the framing in this picture I almost line up the frame of the doorway with the metal bars on the window. I like that only the door frame and the little graffiti characters to the right edge are the only parts clearly in focus and that the metal bars are burred and aren't distracting to the rest of the image. I wish to come back here another day and shoot some more, maybe even bring some lights with me nest time.