Potraiture

So I've selected 'Portraiture' as my theme but what actually is it?
I thought I should take some time to explore my chosen area of work to help aid my understanding of what it entails.

Portraiture is defined as "a painting, photograph, sculpture or other artistic representation of a person, in which the face and its expression is predominant"

Some of the oldest portraits discovered are those on the faces of coins - which tend to be representations of the ruler at the time and therefore this suggests that it was for the higher class and for those in power or had considerable amounts of money.

Obviously, photography is a fairly new development however there are early displays of portraiture through other styles of art such as paintings and sculptures with the Egyptians the suggested origins for the type of art displayed through their Hieroglyphics.

 

 

Through time other forms of portraiture came to light including the development of painting. Again, this used to be for the higher classes and it tended to be the lower classed who actually painted the images.

 

 

 

 

After the development of cameras and the birth of photography in 1816 following the adaptations of the camera obscurer, we saw a massive increase in the amount of people partaking in these traditional portraits and as it became more accessible, many more people of different classes were able to access the sources and were able to use them to document their lives and therefore savour memories that they wasn't able to beforehand.

It has grown and grown in popularity and now cameras are not only used as family instruments, but also as a piece of equipment to create magnificent pieces of art - whether that to show beauty, document an issue or just take nice pictures.

As stated, it is the portraiture I am interested in and I intend to explore different ways to not only make my pictures look good but to also create a piece of work at the end which tells a story and represents something meaningful.