Tag: photography

Portraits of my parents

Leave a comment

photography by mia makila

.

“My Father”, photography by Mia Makila, 2017

“My Father II”, photography by Mia Makila, 2017

“My Mother”, photography by Mia Makila, 2017

“My Mother II”, photography by Mia Makila, 2017

The editing process

Leave a comment

The preparations for my Laura Palmer shoot with Domenique in 2009 (collecting pebbles, rocks, sand and other things you can find on a beach to recreate the scene in my studio)

DSC_0090

Domenique (wrapped in plastic) and the homemade beach

DSC_0072

Original photo (untouched)

laura2

The end result – “Laura”, 2009 (edited in 2013)

I’ve spent so many years editing the photographs of my collaboration with Domenique from 2009. In only one summer, we created almost 20 different characters together. The camera was our love child. We were like lovers in the creativity process – using intuition and instincts as our langunge, we did’t need to speak, we knew exactly what was needed in order to bring the characters to life. I loved working with Domenique but sadly her life started to fall apart at the time and rapidly slipped into a destructive lifestyle of drugs and drama. So I ended it and moved to Stockholm, stopped working with photography – and sold my camera. I am still without a professional camera. But when I have more money I will buy a Canon instead of going back to Nikon. I am a Canon kind of gal.

Me and my old Nikon, 2011

I have evolved immensely as an artist since that summer. I know more about photography editing now, my PhotoShop skills are more advanced and I collected new knowledge about retouch and portrait editing during the two months I spent as an intern at a photo studio last fall. So I can go back to my photo projects and make totally new pictures now just because I am so much better at the editing process.

But what does it mean to edit photographs? It’s so much more than to adjust light and shadow or cropping. It’s about bringing the photo to life  – and to create harmony and a balance in the colors.

Here are two versions of the same photo, first the original picture and the newly edited version where I have played around with both colors and expression. The original photo is softer, more stylish – but I wanted to say more than that – and I wanted the expression to be more powerful and direct.

DSC_0414

untitled12tears

Sometimes, I see new potential in already edited photos, I go back and start over, like this:

DSC_0376

Original photo from 2009, edited version from 2009 and my latest version from 2016

Other times, I use the projects with Domenique as a base for my digital art – like I did in “The Crash” (2012):

taylor

 

More editing work

1 Comment

I have such a treasure trove in my computer. I love editing these photographs from my projects with Domenique. I WILL make something amazing with all these one day. Art show. Photo book. Whatever. I feel so inspired. And I will also add a photography category to my art section on this website (you find it in the menu at the top of the page).

untitled11

“Fröken Ensam” [Miss Lonely Hearts] Photo suite, 2009

Leave a comment

One of my favorite photo projects I made with Domenique in 2009 is the one about Miss Lonely Hearts – a very lonely woman living with an inflatable man and a doll as her only family (although Domenique’s dog occasionally crashed the shoot). I wrote a script, planned everything from wigs, costumes, settings and location. At the time, I was deeply inspired by my favorite photographer Lars Tunbjörk (who captured the soul of Sweden in his photography while he was alive). Although the project is of a sad nature, it turned out pretty funny, thanks to Domenique’s outrageous spontaneity and my sense of humor. It wasn’t until a few year after the project that I understood that it was some kind of a cry for help – that I was the real Miss Lonely Hearts and that my relationship at the time was dead and I felt extremely lonely.

Here are some of the photos from the Miss Lonely Hearts photo shoot and below is a making-of video in Swedish (with my ex boyfriend Jimmy’s extremely loud voice narrating the video in a goofy way, I wasn’t as good at making videos then as I am now, sorry about that). I made the photographs ugly and everything in the story was supposed to be ugly to highlight the uncomfortable nature of loneliness.

Overloaded

Leave a comment
black

Untitled photo project by Mia Makila – model: Domenique

madame_pink

Untitled photo project by Mia Makila – model: Domenique

My hormones are not in balance and I’m having a hard time focusing on the painting. But it’s not only the hormones that is messing with my concentration. My mind feels like it’s about to explode from inspiration. It’s totally overloaded with ideas right now. I’m not complaining, it’s a wonderful experience to be able to create again – but it’s like every idea is restless and wants to jump out of me – all at the same time. I feel a little lightheaded. My mind is overcrowded with creative possibilities and I don’t have the mental stamina to keep up with them. I am painting, making digital art, creating things for the blog, writing, making sketches and now I am also re-editing old photo projects with Domenique. I have ideas for short stories, novels, children’s books, children’s books for adults, ideas for collages, drawings and sculptures, painting techniques that I want to experiment with – and I’m thinking a lot about how I can use the photo projects in a good way. I need to rethink the original idea, it’s just not gonna happen.

dompan38

My first photo shoot with Domenique when we were 14 years old, 1993

It all started in 1992 when I first met Domenique – and the year after we started making photo projects together. She wanted to be a model, I wanted to become an artist. She soon turned into my muse. We never stopped working together even though years could pass in between our meetings. In 2009 I decided to take our projects to a new level. It would be a collection of our works – my documentary photography of Domenique as a person and my own scripted ideas about identity, gender and sexuality told through hundreds of different characters that Domenique would embody in front of my camera. I spent thousands of dollars buying wigs, masks, costumes, props and accessories. I still have a whole box full of weird stuff from that time. It’s my favorite box.

We created more than 20 projects together in the summer of 2009. It was around the time when I started to feel blocked in my art. After that intense summer with Domenique – I totally crashed. I broke up with my boyfriend, slipped into a depression, stopped making art and moved to Stockholm – away from Domenique. She had her own problems to deal with, heavy problems. Life was tearing us apart and away from each other and our artistic connection. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to work with Domenique again. I hope so but it’s not very likely.

That’s why I need to rethink the concept of these projects. I have all these wonderful portraits of Domenique. If I’m not gonna tell the story about her through the characters, what other stories are hidden in there?

More questions to add to my already overloaded mind…