Sunday, February 7, 2016

Kweku Asafu-Adjaye Weekly Post 4 - Nick Brandt



Photographer Nick Brandt's main focus was to capture the "dying" African wildlife. He focuses on capturing not the energy of the animals but instead, the life that the animal lives. His main inspiration to creating these works of art are to show the world how many endangered animals are living and to spread awareness of them as well as to show how the environment they live in is dying and disappear along with the animal.

Brandt's photographs seem to always carry questions. They also seem to always have a narrative behind them. Each photograph is varied. The first one having almost no depth of field with almost no object in the image blurred. The second one is the typical close up shot with the very shallow DOF (depth of field) with very sharp but feathered cropping on the lion's body. The last one shows what the artist can do with a very wide angle lens.

These photographs I chose out of all of his hundreds caught my eye because we normally see the African wilderness as a vast expanse of plains and animals roaming but his show a darker tone. One that is about death and what could be an animal or species reaching its end of times. The first being called Abandoned Ostrich Egg portraying the feeling of loneliness. It gives the question of "Where is the mother of this egg?" or "What happed to cause it to leave?". The second being titled Lion Before The Storm II. A question this could bring is one such as "What storm is coming?" Does this lion know that the area it is in is unfit for habitability? And the final image being called Wildebeest Arc. What happened to this environment? What are the animals in this horde running from?

For more info go to Photography Art Café

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