The following are portraits of my great grandmother, who is 99 years old and
one of the most interesting people I've ever met. So, when I had an assignment
to do a psychological portrait, one that demonstrated the workings of the mind,
personality and thoughts of a subject, I thought of her. The final image of the
post is the one I chose to hand in. She wasn't crazy about me taking photos of her,
in fact she told me she "didn't know why I would want to take pictures of her
anyways," and fussed over what she should wear and so on. They're simple
and that's why i love them. She isn't the person that likes all the fuss, and that's
how I wanted her pictures to be. She looks warm, radiant, strong and happy,
and it's an experience I won't forget.
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| this was one of the first batch i took. |
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This was the second round of pictures that I took that she doesn't know about quite yet.
After doing her formal portraits I noticed one of her violets in bloom so I took
a few shots of it and then sat back down across from her with my camera in
my lap. I realized, that maybe if I could angle my camera just the right way
that I could get some really original shots and get the true great grandma
as she talked to me. Some of them aren't perfect, and she probably thinks
they're terrible, but I'm glad I'll always have those little moments
that are truly grandma. The crops are a little off, but I'd say their pretty good for
shooting blindly from my lap!
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| this is the cute little face she makes when you say something that makes her laugh so she looks away and giggles and does sort of a little head shake at you. |
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| her deeply listening to what your saying. |
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| chit chatting. |
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| sitting in my favourite blue chair, chatting away. |
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| smiling. |
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| the final shot and my absolute favourite, it's truly her; so strong in everything she does, thinks, and says, accepting of the way in which her life has unfolded so far, but more importantly, completely satisfied with the everything that life has given her. funnily enough she told me as I was shooting her that I shouldn't expect much of the photos. little does she realize they're the best portraits i've made so far. |
