NOWNESS
As part of their Define Beauty series, Nowness.com released the following video that shows Shaun Ross talking about his journey and the challenges he faces as an Albino African American. The video, by Jonus Akerund shows a strong emotional connection between the Ross and his identity.
This is influential to my project as it is not only directly related to skin, but how skin differences iare perceived in the fashion and beauty world, with emotional context and strong striking images that incorporate this idea of fashion linking to skin and identity (see the head piece by Maiko Takeda)
THOMAS MAILAENDER
Thomas Mailaender's book ILLUSTRATED PEOPLE used performance photography to capture negative photographs taken from the Archives of Modern Conflict, which were sunburnt into peoples skin and photographed before they could fade.
The work references the fragile hold that memory has to images. It is an important influence to my project because it reveals a relationship between skin and a human condition, depicting memory through sun burn and damage of the skin. I find it really interesting that Mailaender has used diverse "every day" models and almost poleroid-esque photography. I like this - it shows an artistic expression to regular every day people rather than a fashion focussed imitation which, in my opinion, is what makes the photos so extraordinary.
LUCY MCRAE
Lucy McRae is a body architect who explores the relationship between technology and the body. She works very closely to the human skin, making her hugely influential to my project.
"I became obsessed with this idea of blurring the perimeter of the body so you couldn't see where the skin ended and the new environment started."
She has created things like swallowable perfume which releases the odour through the pores of the skin when a person sweats, or a vacuum packed environment that prepares the body for life in space, but puts pressure on the skin and amplifies the sences of the people inside.
Her work is so interesting to me as the creator of this project because again she has used another way to express the connection between the skin and the human condition, linking it not only to technology but to how our skin can actually work and be manipulated. She redefines the roll of skin and this is incredibly valuable when looking at the medium of skin in itself. Skin is more than just a canvas, it is a technology in itself.
