PORTRAITS OF MANNEQUIN

This multi-year cross-regional photography project features mannequins arrayed in commercial settings. While altering traditional framing and composition techniques of photography, I seek to stimulate a new way of viewing among the audience. From the perspective of commercial customers, the main and foremost function of mannequins is to demonstrate the values of the displayed garments as merchandises. Therefore, the vetements are designated as the subject matter and the mannequins serve as mere ancillaries. Furthermore, for the purpose of marketing and advertising, the entire look of the mannequins outweighs the portrait of the mannequins’ faces. Distinct from the conventional view held by commercial photographers, amateur enthusiasts and professional artists, this project directs the focus of the audiences back towards the mannequins through the standardized and successive framing techniques used in real-person portrait shootings. Surrounded by millions of self-portraits produced and consumed throughout social media, the non-human portrait of mannequins becomes a distinctive spectacle in the contemporary social context that accentuates the routine, commercial and political values of photographic portraits. Casting light on the crux of the narratives, the extension of the collective aesthetic and the important role played by the humanities in the development of modern society, this project presents the portraits of mannequins.

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