Analysis: Amy Friend

Amy Friend is a Canadian artist and photographer who grew up in windsor and studied at the Ontario College of Art and Design before travelling around Europe, Morocco, Cuba and the United States. Friend's work has been exhibited in many galleries and has been published in various magazines around the world. 

Amy Friend has lots of inspiration for her photography and has a variety of different pieces in her portfolio. Friend says she's inspired by many things in life such as time, memory, place, water, life and death, freedom, infinity, the stars, movement, silence, stillness, the unknown, and many more. I really like how Friend has focused on a lot of detail in her projects and that her work has a lot of meaning behind it. Freind said in a interview "As cliché as it may sound I want to “touch” people. To gently smack emotion into the air". When looking at Friends work, especially the 'Agua De Noche' and 'Soon This Space Will Be Too Small' I was somewhat quite confused and was trying to figure out my own opinion and emotion about her work because I felt they had a quite obscured meaning. I then read the descriptions and then the photographs started to make more sense because of how the meaning behind the photographs really matched. 

The project 'Agua De Noche' is several photographs taken of hanker chiefs and fabric in the darkness and water. The images portray a story that a Cuban lady told Friend whilst she was travelling around the world. Even though these images are quite simple still life photographs the description that goes alongside the project is very informative and shows that Friend wanted to show her view and have her take on a story that the she got told whilst out in Cuba. For my documentary pathway that I have chosen I feel that I want to focus much more on what Amy Friend does and be able to incorporate more meaning in to the photograph(s) I take by using different techniques and/or basing my photographs around a story or my opinion on a subject (a lot like Mishka Henner's work about prostitution).

I also really loved the project called 'Dare alla Luce' In which Friend used found vintage photographs and altered them by piercing small holes through the image in parts where Friend feels that light is needed to bring the image back to life. I really love the darker vintage photographs because the light being shined through helps show the outline of the subject in the image. I really like how the title 'Dare alla Luce' is an Italian phrase used to describe the moment of birth because it relates relates well with the technique and images.