SECOND FIRST SKIN
PERSONAL SCARVES
OMER GAASH
Graphic design and photogrtapher, Focuses on branding and mapping environments with human bodies.
info@omgstudio.co.il
www.omergaash.com
www.omgstudio.co.il
@omergaash
My motivation for this project comes from my professional background, throughout the years I studied and practice in different fields such as Architecture, Cartography, Graphic design, Photography, and dancing. But also, from my personal way of life, I grow up in a seaside town (Kibbutz) and as kids we used to walk to the beach at night for Skinny Deeping, I remember how free and liberating it felt and how we didn’t make a big deal out of it, each with its own given body, no judgment no questioning about the act, just us and nature. I wanted to expend my practice in both photography and graphic design and create an experience that will combine these two passions of mine. In my work I am looking to explore a way to create experience that will give my audience a sense of ownership and positive thoughts about their history, territory, and especially their body.
︎︎︎ Visit project full page
︎︎︎ More patterns (ig)
︎︎︎ Visit project full page
︎︎︎ More patterns (ig)
Scarf - Garments are something that helps celebrate what we are proud of or conseil things we prefer not to show, some won’t pay attention to outfit at all, but I think it’s another way of showing they do care a lot about what people might say, so much that they will just avoid the subject completely. I’m focusing on specific individuals and their inter relationship with themselves and their surrounding but also see this in a broader way and talk about community, human behavior, and society’s norms. In my project I’m using the scarf as the main craft of work. Scarf is commonly seen in a party wear and as a specialty fashion accessory for the old age people to hide the skin fold and wrinkle near the neck region. It can be used for a religious reason or community dress code. This code can be preserved in deferent ways depending on the geography. For example, in idealized portrait of multicultural London, clothing diversity plays a very significant part, acting as visual proof of British tolerance and acceptance of ethnic and religious differences whilst, at the same time, naturalizing and reifying these differences in the process. In America on the other hand the political map and demographic polls reveal a frightening perception aginst other’s ethnicity and visibility among them Muslims. This escalated during Donald Trump’s speech in South Carolina in 2015 that although was condemn as racism the polls showed how divided the American society is. I will try to take the Scarf as a fashion accessory rather than a religion or political piece and so will show it in another context by avoiding using it as a head covering placing it as a personal identifier rather than an ethnical marker. The focus of my project is more about the wellbeing of the individual.
The nude patterns reflect two maybe more period of times in my model’s life. Then I will take portrait photos of the model wearing himself, skin on skin. Austrian architect, philosopher and artist Friedenreich Hundertwasser in his article “The Five Skins of the Ecological Man” explain about The Five Skins. Hundertwasser explained the connection between the individual, the natural and social environments, by referring to man's five skins. His natural epidermis, his clothes, his house, the social environment, and the planetary skin which are all directly connected to the biosphere, the quality of air, water, and soil. The challenge is to be aware of the dynamic and integrating connections and relations between the individuals and their social and natural surroundings. The First Skin: Epidermis forms the outer layer of the skin, creating a tough, renewable, water-proof barrier against the environment. This is a dry, technical explanation but the theoretical, esthetic of this part is crucial to why I am choosing nudity and body to create these patterns. To be aware of the epidermis is essential to experience nakedness. Hundertwasser also criticized man's illit-eracy of perception and he revered radical affirmation of the right to absolute free-dom of individual expression a perception I relate to and see relevant to my project. The nude photos I will use are a mix of staged photo and archive one that probably had very deferent intention while taken. I see this as a direct and looped connection between these two skins Hundertwasser is talking about. In regard to creativity and individual self-expression, I am looking to make something that is beyond conformism and uniformity. The prepose is to be happy, Happiness does not depend on production. If each of us is creative, we do not need to travel far because paradise is here in the moment. Having this belief, Hundertwasser designed clothes for himself. By doing so he showed his individuality and authenticity. Moreover, the identity of each individual corresponds to the diversity and dissimilarity of clothing. I chose to create for each participant its own pattern and print it on a scarf that is uniquely his, The scarf is within society norm but the print is personal.
Patterns in textile has been developed for years, they can be analyzed because they confine variations within identical motifs. But this possibility recedes as soon as the pattern is made up of looser and more flexible classes and subclasses, forming interlocking hierarchies. When we turn to the larger hierarchies of a Persian rug, we will find it hard to specify the interplay of similarity and difference which governs the design. The stars and lozenges of the rug are related in colour and scale, and the characteristic shape of their outline recurs in the border in a very different context. Its motifs, in their turn, are also distributed over the ground of the central field with colours symmetrically altered. In my design I will try to create these classifications, similarities and connections basing the patterns on geometrical shapes that are definable. Element 'a' may be similar to 'b' in one respect and to 'c' in another- so the design is interesting. Skin in this case is my tool to manifest these patters, a graphic tool that inspired by the epidermis, he will be based on simple, elementary techniques, mate-rials, and colors. Just as the epidermis is a bridge, art is also a bridge between man and nature.
I wanted to develop my project around patterns even before applying to my MA as I knew it can have the right visual DNA to express my ideas. Man needs nature and its habitat to survive. Small scale patterns of human texture represent layer of society and by playing with the scale of my pattern compared to the landscape or an object I reflect about that relationship and connection. This connection can be abusive or co-dependent and symbiotic. Patterns where in use for thousands of years, the motifs change between cultures and the combinations and meanings are endless. For example, Pine, bamboo, and plum are known collectively as the Three Friends of Winter and are symbols of longevity, perseverance, and renewal. The pine tree is an evergreen and lives for many years, bamboo bends in the wind but never breaks, and the plum is the first tree to blossom each year. In Japan the plum is particularly favored for winter kimono as its use suggests that spring is not far away. In the Edo period, it was common to have room dividers in a lattice pattern. Thin wood or bamboo was set horizontally and vertically to create this pattern. It is said that Koushi is based off these patterns. Koushi with thicker lines represents power; thinner lines stand for elegance. Each culture and each region over the years developed and embraced symbols, shapes, and meaning from things around him, nature, animals, spiritual believes and more. Different symbols were used to emphasize the connection between the person how wears the garment to its religion believes such as: The star and crescent, a polytheistic icon adopted during the spread of Islam, and its use today is sometimes controversial in the Muslim world. The Hamsa, also known as the Humes hand, the Hand of Fatima and the Hand of Miriam is a popular symbol found throughout the Middle East and northern Africa, particularly within the Islamic and Jewish faiths. Others are form of decoration like arabesque, geometry, and calligraphy. In my pattern I will use the human body as the tool to create these decorations and give new meaning to the model and viewer. By not basing my visual on known structure and norms, but creating something new, I hope to be able to release the model from its own restrains, projecting something positive by creating esthetic he can wear and be proud of. Since the elements creating the patterns are made from human body in different stages of his life the set of tools I’ll able to produce is limited by several parameters: The model’s age, his mobility and flexibility, the model ability to listen to direction and other outer body parameters such as light condition and our photographer model chemistry. Michael Kimmelman used the bulldozer to examine the relationship between art, architecture, and landscape architecture. The connection is surprising because art is not typically thought of as being a priority in suburbia. However, the common use of the bulldozer, and other everyday technologies—including automobiles, televisions, and fluorescent lights—in both realms reveals their shared interest and dependence on these devices and that what he is using in his work. In relation to Kimmelman’s work I chose scarf as the linkage between the individual and society.
To make the patterns, or as I like to call them, NudeTextures, I had to direct the models at my studio the way I wanted them to appear, I had to consider their physicality and ability and after understanding the limitations we started shooting. Why NudeTexture? The main subject is the naked body and as my background is graphic design and text as paragraph is also a texture, I thought the combination reflects better on who I am as a designer and a person.