Hannah Price is an African-Mexican-American, moved
from Fort Collins, Colorado and after attending college at Rochester Institute
of Technology moved to Philadelphia for three years to pursue her creative
career in photography.
Her series
of work City of Brotherly Love is based on documentation of male strangers who
catcalled Hannah on the street. The the concept of turning camera on her harassers
is to make them to feel vulnerable and exposed or to make them to be in her shoes being
sexually harassed.
First image
represents male character in the middle of the composition. Shot was taken with
natural light, the subject of the scene is backlit halfway so it allows the
viewer still get his facial features and silhouette in the same time. Artist uses
deep depth of field to put surroundings in the focus. Light and shadow create
contrast for the composition. Black jeans and white shirt, dark and light side
of the wall, signage that made with black and white type – those elements are necessary
to build a contrast for entire shot. To add more drama in the composition,
photographer has chosen to decrease saturation. Moreover, look on the face of
the male is important feature – he seems to feel betrayed and taken over by
situation that initially was provoked by him.
The second image sets the main
character in the middle of composition, however this time in different, not
opened, defended manner. Male stays behind glass doors, his clothes and gloves
creates contrast in the foreground of the image, background is based on purple
and yellow complimentary colors. Hannah used closed down aperture to let details
on the background to be visible. He is seemed to be confident and less
vulnerable than the first “victim”. Artist’s reflection is appeared on the
glass door in the order to compose more complicated relation between harassed and
harasser, to emphasize on overtaken power of one over another.
The third composition
appears to be more complex because even though photographer faced her harasser
and attempts to put him in her shoes for a second, he doesn’t seem to be
effected by it. Moreover, the woman whose profile appears on this image apparently
by accident, adds womanizer ability to catcaller’s personality. The shot was
taken that way so viewer can’t really say is she just passing by or she is
sitting on his lap and the movement that we see when she turns away, he is
after another woman. The energy in his eyes is incredibly strong, he seems to
feel more proud of himself than shamed. Composition of the image is based on
setting the subject in the middle and focus only him. Shutter speed is slower than 1\60 because the movement of the woman on foreground is blurred. Artist used wide opened
aperture to shallow depth of field. The focus stays on the middleground. Different
color schemes such as complementary and secondary colors create contrast of the
composition.
Personally, I enjoy Hannah’s
works compositionally and conceptually as well. This series not only based on people’
portraits and their vice behavior towards opposite sex, but also on the beauty of
composition that provoked by ugly behavior. I have similar experience with
photographer who has got catcalled and I am really proud that she had enough
self-confidence and courage to not walk away from it; she took opportunity to
create art from the disturbance.
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