The last comment is apt. It is also very interesting how few of these portraits are of men between the ages of 18-45, when it is fair to say that the majority of the photographers probably fall into that bracket. There is clearly a bias towards picturing, and possibly objectifying, otherness in travel portraiture. This is nowhere more apparent than in pictures of India(ns), of which maybe one in twenty will be of the young men featured in the pictures from Goa (credit to the photographer there). I am interested in this; I wonder how much of it is just aesthetic, how much something less appealing that underlies what we ('we') are doing when we are taking pictures of others. And perhaps the two things: perhaps our ideas of the aesthetic are informed by these other underlying issues.
I am curious to know what people think about this. I offer a portrait as well, my own portrait of otherness. This man was, so he told me, preparing for his upcoming wedding, and had been henna-ed to that effect. Admittedly, I took his picture because he was considering robbing me, and I wanted to placate him (the next picture is of him holding his knife). And when editing the photo I desaturated the background to draw attention away from the heavy sharpening applied to turn an out-of-focus picture into something viewable. And yet the outcome is clearly another picture that focuses on strangeness, otherness (to me). I aimed to make it more confrontational than portraiture usually is, but has it come out just being the same thing? I would love to hear thoughts about this; I'm trying to start the debate on my own gallery page so please drop by and say what you think. Here is the picture (click on it to go to my gallery)
Posted: Tue Sep 19, 2006 2:25 am
Dave