Richard Billingham Ray's a Laugh

Like Larry Sultan Richard Billingham too photographed his parents over a period of time, however the work of Billingham and Sultan couldn’t be more different and that is why I find it vital that I look into his approach to photography. Billingham intended on using the images as guides for his painting but the images themselves put Billingham under an unexpected spotlight. His pictures are extremely fun to look at, because you almost feel as if you’re peering through the curtains of a strangers home. His images are capturing moments as they happen in his  home that he has not constructed which is part of what makes them so interesting and different to Sultan. With the risk of being misapprehended I have to say, he was blessed with the most colourful of subjects that it almost seems as though not much effort needed to be put into the actual photo taking. Inside the council flat which was their family home lives his mother, heavily obese and arms covered in tattoos  along with her husband Ray, his father, an alcoholic. The beauty of these images is that Billingham used a cheap disposable camera to take them, so there is a certain rawness to the image that remind us of family photographs which further encourages us to label them as severely dysfunctional. What Billingham has produced are family photographs which we would never take. This takes us back to the cynicism Sultan felt towards the family album and the sense of commonality emphasised by Morrissey . We for the most part would never record our family’s troubles on the contrary we push them aside and we only record or even think to record on happy occasions, when we will represent ourselves and our family in the most positive light.

Billingham's work is more about what I want to produce within this project than Larry Sultan's, his images are raw and truthful. They are more personal and expressive on those matters. They make me think of photographing my brother when we are arguing, in fact they make me think of angering my brother just for the sake of being prepared and able to get a picture of him when he’s angry. I also like the idea of using a cheap disposable camera for the rawness of the imagery and how that rawness comes across to a viewer. Furthermore with images of  such mediocre quality more of a personal and familial aspect between the photographer and the subject is likely to be assumed. The other thing that is ideal about using a small cheap camera is being able to just carry it around and take quick easy snaps without even giving the subject a chance to realise. Setting up a scene obviously affects their behaviour and causing a lack in realism from your subject.