When I first saw this image I felt quite uncomfortable and I couldn't make out which part of the body I was looking at. The angle in which List has captured this hand at makes it look very distorted and twisted, almost liquid like. The flowing lines of skin mimic water, movement. This hand almost appears as an optical illusion.
I showed this photograph to my friend next to me after seeing it for the first time and he also had a rather extreme, similar reaction to me; one of repulsion and unease. I think that the fact that it is so close up creates an almost suffocating feel to the image, as if we can't escape the detail and texture of the skin. |
After creating and looking at my images, I started to realise that they really reminded me of something I had seen before; Wolfgang Tillmans' 'Astro crusto'. In this piece shown on the left, Tillmans captured a broken crab, depicting its inside and outer shell. At first glance of this piece, I didn't realise what it was at all, I could see flesh like tones everywhere, reminding me of gums and teeth. I couldn't really make out what he had taken an image of at all, all I knew was that I really liked it and it was making me feel really uncomfortable. I feel like a part of this feeling was created by the mystery of it, the fear of the unknown. I didn't really know what I was looking at until I was told that it was a crab and then I started to see it clearly. One thing that I love about this image is the delicacy and subtly of it, the details, the fly and the tiny spots upon the crabs shell, the finer lines. This photograph feels very sharp, rough and full of bumps, almost as if it will graze me as I run my fingers across it. |
The image on the right of the soft, smooth, silky sand works very well with the close up of the palms as there are both lots of similarities within each image, yet a lot of differences too which creates the contrast. The curved, smooth lines of the edges of the fingers held together, mirror the rounded, smooth edges of the sand dunes. The shape and form within each image is rather similar, they are both constructed of smooth lines and rounded shapes, yet the palms show more line and detail as the image is closer up. Having an image taken from a distance in the background and a very close up image in the foreground also plays with our perspective and makes us feel as if we are closer to the hands as they are closer to us, we can see more detail as they are in the foreground of our vision. This play on perspective and perception of detail plays on the senses too, it makes me feel as if I could reach out and touch the image of the hands and feel the lines and creases, as it is in my near vision. However the sand dunes in the background feel almost completely out of reach to me as they appear to be further away.
When I first saw this image, I felt a certain softness and fragility, as the sand and skin appear so dust like and fragile, the thin, aged skin mirrors the lightness and delicacy of the sand. The skin doesn't appear rough at all, even despite its lines and creases, it feels worn, smooth and soft, like an old worn in second hand leather jacket full of memories. |