Dying to be skinny
Love it – 7th-13th October 2008
The power of Food
This is an article of a girl’s story, of how food controlled her life to a point where she nearly killed herself to be thin.
This story shows the power and control of oneself to starve your own body although you are killing yourself:
- Gaining power knowing you are in control of your body
- But losing that power and control when you eat
The power that the mind has to convince the body that the food it needs and craves to survive causes such harm to itself is very powerful. To teach the body the level of repulsion and guilt to slowly start killing itself because our mind has convinced you, you are fat and you can be thinner, and substances that one needs to be healthy are bad for the body, is a very powerful trick.
I feel that the increase in young girls suffering from anorexia and bulimia, has been inflated by the media, as they are constantly putting pictures of skinny celebs in their papers and magazines saying how good they look since they have lost weight, and how much weight they have put on.
Media also plays a role in another way as it is when a victim looks back at pictures of themselves and doesn’t like what they see that they start these eating trends. This is a powerful response from looking at a picture
This power and influence that these media types have over young girls and the way they look at themselves is quite a dangerous one, as the article states, how close to death the girl came just to be thin.
Money = Power
Stephen Gill has also produced a series called Cash points, which is a series of photographs of cash points. My interpretation of this series is that the cash points represent power. They control the money you can access. When someone withdraws money from a cash point they feel a buzz of having that money in there hand which can make someone feel powerful for the time they have hold of it. However once they have spent that money they don’t feel that powerful anymore, which will result in them going to a cash point and with drawing money again to feel that same power. This is a vicious circle and can lead to a person going into debt, is that feeling of power becomes addictive to them. For this reason I feel this series is showing power as the first thing people will link with it is money.
However it could be a symbol of frustration to someone who is not very wealthy, as every time they access a cash point they know they are spending money they shouldn’t, therefore causing depression. This could therefore show a loss of power for the person, making the cash point more powerful.
‘Money is the route of all evil’
Money = power + influence
People with money are powerful for the wrong reasons
After looking at the series of cash points, I decided money could be a good focus point. My idea would be to an image simalr to the one used in ‘American Beauty’, where we see the girls body covered in rose petals, this images shows the power of the female form. However I would have my image showing the power of the money.
- A person dressed smartly in a suit with a smug and powerful look about them selves, lying on a bed of money, consisting of notes. This photograph would show the power the money has
- A person dressed scruffily looking content but with a sense of struggle/sadness, lying on a bed of money, but this time coppers and other coins of low value. This photograph would represent no/minimal power.
- Someone dressed smartly looking smug and powerful but lying on a bed of monopoly money, representing false power
I think it could also be interesting to switch the first 2 ideas around, having a person who looks poor and not very influential lying on a bed of notes and a person dressed smartly and quite powerful lying on a bed of low value coins. This would show that the power is in the eye of the person not just in what a person owns.
If I had the time and resource to create a picture on this scale using money I think it would show power really well. Also doing the same picture with different styles of money, such as monopoly money and lower denominations of money would be able to show peoples different circumstances with money and power.
However I feel that showing the person in the ‘sea’ of money wearing clothes that we would associate or represent power or lack of power, to the mass population would be good as I could then also contradictions to money and power.
Many people show power through the way that the dress, and vice versa, those with a lack of power tend to dress that way as well. This is true of most people; however there are few people who try to hide how powerful/powerless they actually are. Dressing down there power, or trying to look as though they are very powerful, when in fact they have little influence
and money.
There are also people who think they are powerful, but it is a false power.
I feel I could get a lot form this subject, but due to source I would be unable to find the money to be able to take a photograph on this scale using bank notes.
I think creating a photo more on this scale would be easier, but still get across the point I want to. Obviously the person would be holding money instead of cards. I would use the clothing as well as the money to represent my different versions of power. I think this is more achievable.
I have also considered using different locations to help to show the influence that money can have on a person’s life and the power that they can gain from the money.
For instance
· A person stood in the doorway of a council house on a rough estate, not looking very well kept holding coppers in their hands
· A person stood in the doorway of a council house on a rough estate, dressed very well as though they are quite powerful holding coppers in their hands
· A person sat in an office wearing office clothing looking very important holding notes of high values in their hands
· A person sat in an office, not looking very smart or that they should be working there, holding notes of high values in their hands.
· A person looking very smart and well dressed sat at a classroom desk holding monopoly money
These are just some ideas, but I think the first photographs I will take and look at will be taken in the studio with people holding the money but keeping the other ideas in mind in case I would like to progress the idea futher.
Idea Development
For my power idea I have said that I have taken inspiration from American beauty, to have a person lying on money as the girl was with rose petals. I could animate these stills to have the money falling down on to them.
All of the stills could then be incorporated into each other to have the money changing as it falls, real money, coppers and monopoly money. Also the person on the floor would be changing what they were wearing to show many different combinations of power, lack of power, and false power.
