Angela Strassheim...

Angela Strassheim is an artist who lives and works in New York City. She has done many series on forensic photography and has also photographed how woman can be victimised and isolated within violent relationships. However it is her generational images which she entitles ''left behind'' that portray the relationships between disrupted families in controversial circumstances. She has lived and worked in New York for over 12 years and studied at Yale University-School of art, from 2001-2003.

The photos she took represent the side of family we don't always photograph and put on display, for example her pictures of a sleeping child or someone in a coffin. However although many of them are somewhat controversial she manages to capture the sometimes unlikely and unique relationships between people for example the picture of the mother and daughter in the bathroom.

She also takes pictures of generations in the family for example her picture of the father and son shows how the father is a role model and someone for the boy to look up to.

Image Analysis...

This image is one from her series on ''left behind''. The picture is taken within a mirror and shows a father helping and teaching his son to get ready. The boy is standing directly in front of his dad facing the mirror.

The boy has his eyes fixed on himself as if he is fascinated by the way his dad is getting him ready, perhaps because it is in the exact way his father looks, or perhaps his staring gaze is due to the concentration of the new independence he has.

However, there is an innocence to how the father has his hand on the boys right shoulder as he pushes a comb through his hair whilst he looks slightly at his son ,proudly.

Furthermore, the generational theme is emphasised with what the two are wearing; the shirts and ties show how the son is almost copying his father so much to indicate and show off how he looks up to his dad. 

The photo is taken with the studio light and this brightens the front of the image whilst keeping the background shadowed to make the focal point of the image the boy and his father and not the clutter in the background. However there are two toothbrushes,  toothpaste, and soap in the foreground of the image which further symbolises the pair getting ready together.

The image portrays the relationship between the two which wouldn't necessarily be found in a family photo but the sensitive bond is captured in the every day occurrences of family life.

My responses...

In my photographs I wanted to portray the way the family influences the family and the way the older members of the family teach the younger members. For example I chose to show the classic father, son ;mother ,daughter relationship and how the father and mother influence the way their children get ready and grow up to do things in the same way they taught them to, often just by the child watching, learning and imitating their movements.

I used the daily getting ready routine to capture the way the mother helps but also teaches her daughter to get ready and how as they grow up they eventually end up with the same routine which was passed down by generations.

I also wanted to show that as the years goes by their are influences on what you should look like for example as the mother puts of her make up, so does her daughter as she thinks it is the norm and has always been that way because that's what her mum does.

As the son grows up the father teaches him to shave, and groom himself ;become a 'man' and as this learning occurs their routines merge into identical routines ,just in separate generations.

Furthermore, I wanted to show generational similarity between the siblings. I wanted to exaggerate the 'ginger gene' by doing the close up shots of the eyes of and almost distracting ginger hair, to show the similarities between generations within the family as well as the similarities between routines.

Reshoots...

I decided to reshoot some of the original images to make them more refined. I did this by making sure the clothing we wore was the same so it emphasised the element of imitation from mother and daughter. I also brightened the lighting to make it seem more clinical and perfected. I took some photos of individual features to further enhance the idea of similarity within the family and portray the theme of generation throughout my responses.

In my first set of responses I started to develop the idea of generation similarity. With my reshoots I wanted to exaggerate this further by taking close up shots of the parents features, for example the eyes to show the generational element from Angela Strassheims work in my responses.