Tuesday, September 29, 2015

Visual Analysis of "Girl Culture" Photo #7

Note: I could not post the actual picture for fear of copyright; so here is a clip art of a stick girl.

www.clipartpanda.com

     For this picture, one can immediately notice the girl bent down in the center of her bedroom amongst a pile of her clothes strewn all over the floor. Her room is in complete disarray: drawers are open and covered with clothes; the floor is almost completely hidden under a sea of clothes, bags, and paper; her desk is lined with clothes; and the wall racks hold even more clothes. These details provide the most interesting aspects of the picture because they immediately provide enough information for the viewer to know what is happening: the girl, through her desire to look her best, is frantically looking for new clothes to wear; and this insecurity to "be a new girl" is not a sudden one--the massive amount of clothes is enough proof.

     The photographer wants to elicit understanding that girls can have a huge insecurity about their personal appearance. This given scenario implies that the girl is insecure about what she wears (an insecurity most likely brought about by going somewhere public [a school, perhaps?]); thus, she tries to wear the best, most varied clothes--on the floor is a bag from Gap, a fairly expensive store known for its comfortable clothing; and on the wooden beam are many different scarfs wrapped around it.

     Certain nuances brought by the photographer gives credence to the above interpretation. The focus of the photograph is the girl (she is in the center of the entire photo) and the clothes on which she is standing (they are practically everywhere). The photographer provides a good balance of detail to allow the viewer to absorb how many clothes this girl has: the clothes are not just on the left side of the picture, but they are also on the right side of it as well (either on the wooden beam, near the lower right corner of the photograph, or even on the bed). An interesting detail that some may glance over is the large number of dark clothes on the floor--even she is wearing a black shirt in the photo!--a possible testament to an insecurity about her body, since dark clothes are "slimming" clothes. A final note is that this photograph may not be a picture of her entire room; there could be more if the photographer turns around.

     A larger claim one can make with the photograph is the effect of the occurrence of people judging others and themselves based on what they have seen or heard from other people or from television. Seeing fancy clothes or being ridiculed for wearing low-quality ones can alter a person's behavior and make her hyper-attentive to her looks rather than her own personal qualities. By constantly trying to "dress to impress," people can become so enamored in their pursuit to look prettier or more handsome that they, too, will stand in the middle of everything, bend down, and frantically rummage through the mess to find what they once were happy to be.

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