Utopia Project

Persona Project

Creating Persona

For this project I decided to work with the idea of both an internal and external persona. I thought about the difference between the notions we have about our own personas and the way we are perceived by others. In order to explore those differences in myself I had my friends take my picture in hopes that it would present a more honest way in which I appear to the world. In each photo I am being dressed and posed by a friend so as to appear as a kind of epitomized version of myself. The only variables that I had control over were the background and the position of the camera, otherwise they completely directed the photograph. Each person took three to four different pictures and then I chose one from each batch so as to make the filter my persona through another lens. Instead of having my friends take full control over their portrayals of myself I also let my notions about my persona help construct the project thus leading to an image made by two perceptions rather then one. I put the project on a grid because I wanted it appear as a contained piece. Almost as if the physical object of the project were a body and the pictures, windows into the persona. I also had each friend autograph his or her final picture because I wanted the viewer to question the nature of the project rather then just take it for self-portraiture. Each signature seems to separate the work into the contribution of various artists even though the images have a clear uniformity to them.