Gretchen Thom Artist Statement

I’ve always been interested in photography, but just recently is when I finally decided to actually try doing something with it. I experimented with finding my own style and taking pictures of my view of the world. I started out by taking a set of photos paying homage to Berenice Abbott, a famous photographer who took a lot of pictures of architecture. While doing this project I found that my style was very different from hers but that was the fun part of it. Next I began working with Photoshop and learning about the different uses and techniques. I did some work on vintage photographs and putting parts of my images into parts of Berenice Abbott’s photographs or vice-versa. After that I began working with typography, also using Photoshop. I had a lot of fun with typography, but I struggled with how I liked my finished photos.  I really seemed to figure out the photoshop thing very quickly and enjoyed working on typography a lot. I think it’s a skill that I’ll still be able to use in a few years. Finally I worked on Annie Leibovitz type photos. I used two of my best friends who are twins (and pursuing a modeling career) as my models for this photo shoot. The pictures turned out great, and although they weren’t quite as extravagant as Annie’s, they really fit my style.

My favorite photos out of all of my projects were the Annie Leibovitz inspired ones. I didn’t think I would really enjoy taking photos of people because I usually only take photos of objects or still life, but I really enjoyed it. I liked putting the models in ways that it would be kind of shocking, like them standing out in the snow in tank tops, or making the colors of their eyes pop out. I also really liked learning how to use Photoshop, and I would like to continue working with it. I would also really like to continue with my photography. I love the feeling you get after taking an amazing picture, and I have the resources to do so. I want to take more pictures of people, and I would also like to try taking pictures of interesting landscapes and start to get away from just taking close up images of still objects. I have an aunt who worked for National Camera for many years and has taught a lot of classes on photography, so I would like to start working with her so I can continue with photography. Throughout working on these projects, I’ve learned a lot about photography in general, ways to improve my photography, new tools, and even about famous photographers, and all of it has inspired me to keep working with my photography.

Annie Leibovitz

Anne Leibovitz has a very unique and interesting style. She sets up photos that are very shocking and draw you into the picture. Her pictues also show off her model's personalities very well. She has a good way of framing the pictures to portray their personality.

Annie was born in Connecticut. She remembers her mother always taking a lot of pictures when she was younger. Her father was in the Air Force and she began taking her first photos on the base when he brought the family with him to the Philippines. She went to college to be a painter at the San Francisco Art Institute. Soon after that she began taking photos and developing a style. For a while after college she became very interested in taking photos of rockstars. She went on tour with the Rolling Stones, then soon after became a photographer at Rolling Stones magazine. She was soon named chief photographer and worked at the magazine for 10 years. She became more interested in other magazines and also learned how to take photos of other people but let her style shine through. She soon became photographer at Vanity Fair magazine.


Annie Leibovitz is most noted for her photos of famous celebrities. She uses fantastic lighting and sets up amazing photoshoots to create astounding photographs. Annie liked to push the limits on her photographs which sometimes caused quite the controversy, but her edgyness is what makes her photos great.

Typography

We are working on typographical designs, while paying homage to poets Connie Wanek and Louis Jenkins. We experimented with different effects on Adobe Photoshop while combining the words of their poems with photos that we took.

Typography

Graphic design by Gretchen Thom

"First Snow" poem by Louis Jenkins

Helvetica

In class this week we watched a film about the font type of Helvetica. I had never really paid much attention to types of fonts that I see every day: on commercials, on buildings, on the internet, on posters, etc. After watching this film I found myself looking at a poster and thinking to myself, "oh, that's helvetica font." Also before watching this film I had no idea about seriffs and sans seriffs, and now I notice fonts with them all the time. Actually, when I first started typing this blog my first thought was that this font had seriffs. What type of font adverstisements used never really mattered to me before. Now I see how much of a difference it makes. Helvetica is very clean cut and modern, and makes things pop.


Also in class this week we were told to research David Carson. I found a lot of his stuff sent a very interesting message, but I thought that his work was kind of busy and hard to read. No doubt it is amazing and I wish that I was as good as he is, but a lot of his work I found hard to read. His messages are also hard to understand sometimes, and what the piece was for. I noticed in Google images a lot of his work was book covers, and I never really realized that books had covers like that, and how much work it takes for one thing like that.


I hope that I can learn more about graphic design during this project, and I want to use David Carson as an example. I never had any experience previous to this class doing graphic design or photoshop, but I'm learning a lot.

Retro-Vintage/Homage to Berenice Abbott

Next in my homage to Berenice Abbott

Next in my homage to Berenice Abbott, I plan to go to downtown Minneapolis. Recently I've also found out she did a lot with interesting symmetry and close ups  of interesting lines. I also found she did a lot of photos with people in them, so while I'm in Minneapolis I want to get more photos of people in them. I would also like to get photos of wider city views, from up higher.  I want to go in some of the skyways and take photos from there. Here are a few of my photos for my homage so far: