A Mothers Love by Louise Axby-Hirst

This project reflects on my own childhood, in comparrison to the childhood I give to my children, and also looks at and questions, my constant struggle for acceptance from my own mother.

The Original Pin-Up Girl

Sarah Williams is everything all american, these images were shot for her feature intended for Milk Cow Magazine. I mainly shot in the studio using various props and war time memorabilia, and then at the North American Motor Co, Hampshire.  http://www.northamericanmotorco.com/

Seeking The Person

‎"In portrait photography there is something more profound we seek inside a person, while being painfully aware that a limitation of our medium is that the inside is recordable only so far as it is apparent on the outside" 

Irving Penn

'Between Photography and Illustration' by Louise Axby-Hirst

The above image was taken for an american lifestlye magazine, 'Milk Cow' The model Sarah Williams is all things american, I took a series of images for her portfolio that I will show in one of my future blogs. I decided to use the above image for a digital project I was working on, looking at photography and illustration working together. The camera’s customary concentration in the fashion and advertising industry is placed on the product, ‘clothes’ within these digital pieces it is replaced by illustration
In today’s world we are overpowered by thousands of advertisements and visual representations of products so our curiosity in the product has become lost, and we as the consumer require more than just the representational photograph to stimulate our senses.

The need for more to grasp our attention and trigger our desire for the product has resulted in the photographers, and creative directors pushing back the boundaries of the traditional. Fashion photography now has the ability to bridge the gap between the real and the imaginary, using narratives, life issues and symbolism, in this age of digital the fashion photographer’s limits are endless. The clothes and the models seem somewhat hidden beneath the photographer, stylist, and creative director’s vision. We only need to look at photographers such as David La Chapelle, and Steven Klien, to see the evolvement of fashion photography today. If we think of La Chapelles compilations that are packed with so much visual information that the fashion reference can almost be lost. Steven kliens images of Brad Pitt for vogue, where he was styled as a victim of male rape, shows us the advances that have been made under the title of fashion photography.

The post production technique I have chosen to apply to my own work seems to fall into the acceptance of fashion photography now. Instead of just a documented image of a styled model or garment, this technique has given me the opportunity to create my own self-expression of the image, creating something between photography and illustration, where the viewer of the image is faced with the juxtaposition of the real and the drawn.
My research into this postproduction technique has shown me that this is a digital trend within the fashion and advertising industry at the moment. We are seeing it more and more in magazines, on advertising billboards and campaigns, and it is being further influenced by photographers such as Rankin, who makes use of the style in his own work.
My main intention was to move away from the traditional and the expected, I wanted to create images that have a non-conformist approach to the conventional fashion image. Inspired by the abstract and intensely colourful pieces at the decode exhibition, and also the fashion illustrations of Julie verhoeven

'Too Suggestive To Show'

Most of my fans and blog followers will recognise the image above as being from the series of work; 'While No One's Watching'. Many of you know that this was my final degree project at Thames Valley University Reading. through this body of work I questioned the notion of the reversed gaze, in contemporary fashion advertising, and through my research of this subject I looked at many other relevant issues concerning the world of advertising and sexually charged imagery. I found myself asking the question 'Does sex sell'? we only need look at recent advertising campaigns from fashion houses such as Dolce & Gabbana, and Prada to name but a few, also the images of photographers Stephen Klein, and Bruno Dyan, to see that sexually charged imagery sells a product. Suggestions of 'gang rape' 'voyeurisim', and 'sexual dominance' are the focal point of many advertising campaigns, but is this wrong? or are the photographers and creative directors just giving the public/the consumer what they want? and tapping into many of our hidden fantasies or taboo desires?

All of this research was carefully considered as I shot this body of work, so image my surprise when I was informed by my own university, the same university that taught me the theoretical approaches on all of these subjects that my above image would not be shown in the university final exhibition due it being too suggestive!!!

As you can image i could not believe that an image like mine that could be seen when you open any fashion magazine in the world today, would not be shown in a university exhibition because of it's 'suggestive' nature! I felt I had to get to the bottom

 of this, so I emailed the person responsible for this decision to gain his response and was told;

 "There is the issue that our VC seems to have a problem with blood and flesh! And although I’m aware that this smacks of censorship; a showcase is a showcase and some editorial control is inevitable.

So do not take it personally at all."

I found it extremely hard to appreciate what this man was saying in regard to my work and the theories and practices that i had been taught by the university. I left the discussion there needless to say minds were not changed, and my image was not shown at the end of year showcase exhibition, instead the full body of work was shown at The proud Central Gallery London.

Streets Of New York

My wedding day!! New york city an hour after marrying photographer Peter Hirst, we were faced with a security alert, on the streets of Time Square. I expected panic after 9/11, but instead I saw wonder, curiosity, frustration, and inconvenience. There was no fear, no running in the opposite direction. This fascinated me, so instead of me watching the 'suspect case' I watched the people of the streets of NYC and turned my camera to capture their reactions.

The Boxer

The image that launched my photographic career!! This was the first image that I ever took; I had started an A-Level night class in photography, and had never used a proper camera (manual) before in my life. The Brief was 'Portraiture' and that was it, I had decided to find someone as interesting as I could to photograph, someone with a story, a story that I could capture within the image. So armed with my just purchased 2nd hand Nikon FE2 I found a local boxing club and went along. I kind of new what I wanted to achieve before I even got there but didn't think I could do it. Once I looked through the lens things looked different, I saw the world with different eyes, images were everywhere, and where ever I looked I became inspired excited passionate. I knew I was where I should be, and this is where I found my passion and hunger for photography.

'Our Little Secret' by Louise Axby-Hirst

This body of work was an important achievement in my early photographic education. Although this is not a recent piece of work to me it was an extremely important one. Through this body of work I learnt how to question and visually answer the issues and repercussions of this terrible situation. I wanted to show not phy...sical damage of child abuse, but mainly the emotional abuse that leave deeper, longer lasting scars. Some signs of child abuse are subtler than others, but to me the most lasting scar from child abuse is the loss of that child.I chose not to depict the obvious, but rather the journey of how a happy carefree child is lost, and the stages that child goes through when been abused. I wanted to show the heart ache, the fear, the fight and finally the submission as that child is finally lost in torture of their situation. The feeling of hurt, fear, dread, but mainly guilt and worthlessness.

'Our Little Secret' by Louise Axby-Hirst

This body of work was an important achievement in my early photographic education. Although this is not a recent piece of work to me it was an extremely important one. Through this body of work I learnt how to question and visually answer the issues and repercussions of this terrible situation. I wanted to show not physical damage of child abuse, but mainly the emotional abuse that leave deeper, longer lasting scars. Some signs of child abuse are subtler than others, but to me the most lasting scar from child abuse is the loss of that child.
I chose not to depict the obvious, but rather the journey of how a happy carefree child is lost, and the stages that child goes through when been abused. I wanted to show the heart ache, the fear, the fight and finally the submission as that child is finally lost in torture of their situation. The feeling of hurt, fear, dread, but mainly guilt and worthlessness.

Break Me Gently

The whole process has been a learning experience for me where Stacey was concerned. I started out with very preconceived ideas as to who she was and why she behaved like she did, I suppose in a way I just saw her through everyone else’s eyes, before I actually learnt to look by communication and understanding.

I wanted to explore Stacey’s identity at the start of this project and find out exactly who she was, to enable me in this task I have further educated myself in the writings of many theorists, and found, learned, and applied, their considerations and theories to my work, which has given me a greater insight into this whole project.

I feel I did get answers to the questions that I had posed for myself, the girl that I thought Stacey was is no more and has been replaced with a self fashioning individual successful within her deceptions. I now understand that it is unlikely Stacey comes from a broken or abusive home but more of the possibility of a materialistic one, where emotions are replaced financially, and where a lack of love, and attention, triggers a reaction. As written by Joanne Finkelstein, in The Art of Self Invention; ‘people can have a second identity – a darker side second self.' I am not by any means saying that Stacey is evil, or deranged in anyway, but just merely starved of the right kind of attention.

By the time I had finished photographing Stacey there was an accepted relationship between us. She was aware that I saw her, the true her, in all of those little moments when she let her guard slip I crept in, and documented what I saw. I believe Stacey and I have an unspoken agreement, which is I understand her and she allows me do that.

One of the most important factors of this body of work is how it finally would be presented, I had taken the viewer on a journey, one which in images or words alone would be indescribable, and I owed more to it than that. For many years I have been working towards involving more than just the image to my work, but involving emotion, feeling, passion, all those factors that are needed to make something truly great, to hold you in that captured moment of past time, and make you wonder, make you question, but mainly make you feel. I wanted to put all of those vital elements into this body of work, and this resulted in a motion essay.