John Clang
Artist gallery
Artist analysis
John Clang is a photographer and visual artist who was born in Singapore in 1973, originally as 'Ang Choon Leng'. John received his current name during a national service as his name tag read out 'C L And'. By 1999, Clang moved to New York City where he was represented by Art+Commerce from 2002 to 2007. John held his very first exhibition which was actually a duo-show at the Singapore art group 5th passage artists. By 2001, Clang held his first solo exhibition at the Dianne Von Furstenberg foundation in New York City. Since that show, he has continued to contribute to many solo and group exhibitions internationally over the years. His photography includes many different environments including urban and city sorts, he likes to go very populated areas going about their usual day-to-day business. Clang feels that the commonplaces attract him and that he resonates with subject matters similar to daily life, He believes that urban and contemporary themes create a sense of identity and place in this world.An instillation of his work is in the permanent collection of the Singapore Art Museum and his work is still being collected today by private collectors from all around the work. he currently lives in two different places: New York and Singapore.
In John Clang's photos taken in 'Time', Clang takes images and likes to experiment with editing them and creating different sorts of effects like a jigsaw puzzle where he crops people from different photos taken in the same place, and places them into a different photo and continues to do so until each frame has a clear shot of a person which differs from any of the other people in the same photograph.Clang likes to place his photographs together in a unique and quirky way by making each section of the photo he crops and ripping them so the sides have a frayed, rugged look.By doing this, he wants to show how close we all are (as humans) in the urban environment and that we are all guests of the same room, just at different times.He expresses time-spatial distortion and combines with his abstract aesthetics, it takes the viewer to explore the incredible concept of how time moves with a interesting and different rhythm as well as a sense of humour.
Clang's work links to identity because, by taking pictures of many different strangers, he is exploring each and every one of their lives, personalities and identities. This is achieved because when each photo in 'Time' is seen, the viewers wonder who each person is, where they are going, what are they wearing and each of these concepts link closely to identity. Clang creates a whole new way to view people and all of this is done by a simple photograph.
Photoshoot plan
Photoshoot plan annotation
For my photoshoot, I have said that I will be going Oxford street and taking pictures of people there in crowds. I will ensure that I keep my camera moderately still so I can merge the photos together whilst still keeping the background in place as John Clang does. I will be taking my photos in daylight on a cloudy day similar to Clang as it gives the photo an interesting effect. I will be also putting my camera on an automatic setting as something more advanced is unnecessary for this photoshoot.
Contact sheets
Contact sheets annotation
For my contact sheet I went to bustling places in London and took many different pictures standing in the same place. I aimed to photograph people mainly when they looked interesting to make the photos unique and bold. The photos I have circled are due to them being clear and interesting which was my ultimate aim for this shoot. The photographs I have crossed are due to them being blurry and uninteresting so they will be photos that I will not include further in my project
First developments
First developments annotation
For my first developments, I took the most interesting people from each photo and put all of them together into one to create 8 John Clang inspired photos. I aimed to use people who dressed well or funky as I think they created more character for the photo overall which made the photos more like Clang's. To improve, i would take these photos at a different time of day or with different weather to make them look even more interesting however I believe that these turned out very successful anyways.
Highlighting success
Highlighting success annotation
I have chosen these photos as my highlighting success' for my first developments because I feel that they portray what Clang is trying to accomplish the most. I think that the fact they are all quite cluttered makes them look very good because it emphasises the amount of people which links to the amount of different identities. I also like these photos as I think that they contain the most interesting looking people which were the people I was aiming to photograph in my plan for this photoshoot. Overall I think that these images are great but if I had to make one critique I would say that they would look better if the backgrounds matched up exactly.
Second developments
Second developments annotation
For my second developments, I wanted to try something that I had not tried before so I decided to play with the blur filter and discovered a very cool design that I decided to use for my edits. To do this and relate it to identity in a way, I decided to blur out some of the faces of the people on the streets ,to make the people who's faces aren't blurred out more interesting and make the viewers wonder about their identity. To improve, I think I could make the blurry lines more even and organized
Highlighting success
Highlighting success annotation
I have chosen these as my highlighting successes because I think that the blurred lines on these particular edits make it seem much more cool and funky and definitely makes the people appear more interesting. On these photos, it is noticeable that some people are more in focus than others as well as there being more blurred faces which makes these photos overall better than the others.
EXPERIMENTING WITH COLOUR:
B&W edits
B&W annotations
I feel that these B&W edits were very successful because I think that they create a mysterious atmosphere where everything and everybody is dark which makes all of their identities more hidden and secret. I love the way that the black is really dark and adds a lot of depth to the picture which makes it more interesting as well a contrasting with the really bright white light. To improve this, I would burn some areas on the lighter pictures to add more to the picture overall.
Oversaturated edits
Saturation annotations
I think that these edits turned out very successful because I think that the pop of colour that is added makes the people seem much more fun and interesting as well as making the setting prettier. I love the way that the colours like orange and red stand out, creating each photo to look quite autumnal and I think that look is very nice. To improve on these, I would spread out the saturation more so it doesn't look too heavy in some places
Third developments
Third developments annotations
For my third developments, I printed out all of my second developments and then ripped them up and stuck them together because that is what Clang does. I aimed to pick pictures of different sizes, quality and people to ensure each development is as unique as possible. I found it particularly hard to rip all of the photos due to the fact that I had to make sure I didn't accidentally rip off their faces and each development took about an hour to make. To improve, I could have added something creative such as stitching or used different materials but overall I am extremely happy with how these turned out.
Highlighting success
Highlighting success annotation
I have chosen these as my highlighting successes because I think that the fact that I used many thin slips rather than thick slips cause these photos to look better than the others. I tried my best to rip the photos so that the white portion of the rip showed more than the side where you cant see the white. As well as this, I added many different people into the gaps of the rips to ensure I was ultimately using as much space as I could and I think that the fact that the photographs look cluttered adds to the look of the sort of street art form that I am going for
AO4 experiments
A04 annotation
For my AO4 experiments, I decided to do something very similar to my third developments but expanded. I printed some of the photos out on tracing paper and did the same ripping, sticking process that I used for my first developments, but instead of sticking them onto card as I did my third developments, I stuck them out on tracing paper and then proceeded to photograph them on a light box. I love how the end results turned out as I think that the light that is peaking through the tracing paper causing the transparency of it to become more visible makes it look very beautiful. As well as this, I also put the photos through photoshop and added a black and white layer mask which I erased on some of the ripped columns to allow the colour and bright saturation to pop out. To improve, I feel that I could have used more space on the tracing paper however I quite like on these photos how they do not appear cluttered so overall I absolutely love how these turned out.
AO4 highlighting success
AO4 highlighting success annotation
I have chosen these as my most successful highlighting success' because I think that they look the best due to the fact that they have more variety in terms of the sizes of the rips and the people look quite different and unique. I also love the fact that in both photographs, the pages are almost completely full and I think that the fact that they are cluttered makes them look very good. I also think that the colour on the layer masks were places beautifully creating an organised array of saturation which gives both of the photos personality.
AO4 further developed
Highlighting success
I did this by ripping up some of my developments and then placing them in a frame. I loved the aspect of incorporating the ripped style of John Clang into my AO4 as I think that it looks very cool and interesting