Controversial Locations - Where do YOU draw the line?

I think taking pictures in a private cemetery should be off limits, since, well... if it's private, YOU are not even supposed to be there, let alone a bunch of your dolls too. XD

I just recently did a photoshoot in a cemetery. I don't find it offensive at all. I have nothing but respect for the dead and the life they once lived, and any spirit that may still be there will know that I mean no harm.

I could understand why a person related to that deceased person might be angry to be visiting their departed loved one only to find a bunch of dolls hanging out on the gravestone. I guess it's kind of a double edged sword. I don't feel that the deceased would feel disrespected, but the living who knew the deceased might.

 

There is an old graveyard not far from here, I used to take my son there for walks when we lived closer to it because its a beautiful quiet place with history. I don't step on graves, go around, but have taken pictures there of it (before ABJD), especially the old angel statuary. I did not take photos in newer sections or where it might disturb others visiting (no visitors were there at the time)

If you are doing it respectfully, I don't think photos are wrong, now if your being loud obnoxious and rude, or photographing dolls doing something something making fun of the grave or being crude on it, thats another story. (personally though I would not set something on a marker or grave aside from flowers)

 

You may want to do a bit of research on the history of Western cemetery design, Chikku.

Actually, I would recommend that for ANYONE who's inclined to get up in arms over people being in graveyards for "secular" reasons... Burial spaces designed along the lines of what Americans think of as a "traditional" cemetery are usually based on Victorian strolling gardens, particularly those established in the late 19th century (Like my own favorites here in Seattle and in Asheville-). They were very explicitly designed for the use and enjoyment of the living.

(Julian Litten's The English Way of Death is an excellent place to start if you're interested in the hows and whys of this sort of thing, along with John Morley's Death, Heaven and the Victorians.)

 

History or design doesn't necessarily change how people feel, though... If an adult was playing with toys on one of my family members' graves, I would probably be upset and feel as though they were being disrespectful. It's also one thing to stroll and have picnics amidst graves and another to drape dolls over the actual headstones.

In addition to what others have said, I think intent is important. For example, taking a picture of your doll in a landmark church might be fine. However, if you were taking a picture of your satanic demon priest doll in a landmark church, that would be disrespectful because you'd be using someone else's place of worship in a way that is directly counter to their beliefs. For the same reason, I don't feel comfortable seeing dolls using real, recognizable religious items for "edgy" alternate purposes. For example, I remember seeing a doll crossdressing a sexy bondage nun, tied up with a real rosary. I found it extremely disrespectful. I would find someone using a church or gravesite as a backdrop for a smutty photoshoot similarly offensive.

In general, I feel that artists need to be mindful of the real or conventional usages of places or props.

Personally, I wouldn't take pictures of my dolls in a graveyard because I think that putting toys on someone's final resting place could be kind of tacky. I also find that the scale is just totally wrong. I have only seen one graveyard photoshoot that I have really enjoyed. (And that one was really beautiful and sensitive... one of my favorites, actually.)

It's one of those things where I wouldn't say anything if others did it, but I wouldn't do it myself.

 

i personally feel no area is off limits for photographs, with any sort of prop either. cause no matter what you do you're going to affend someone somewhere. so i really don't care.

if say at a grave yard there is a funeral going on. i'll stay away from that area, so as not to disturb the ceramony nothing to do with offensiviness. same with a church. as long as it's not in session, i don't see a problem with it. cause then your not disturbing the ceramony. wedding or reunion going on in a park i stay away from that area.

i have a problem with being rude. not offensive. cause you can't get around that no matter what you do. taking a picture of your doll in a park with no one around could be offensive to someone cause they think it's for humans, and dolls aren't human. or taking a picture of your doll in any public place cause they think your doll shouldn't be taking out in public.

and some time the point of the artist's work is to be offensive, or controversial. not all art is soposed to be happy art. some is meant to step on toes. it's to make a statement. a big one. best way to do it. is to step on someones toes. my dad bought one of those plaques from alabama in 1930 that says colored section and white section. we are getting a sign that says smoking section and another that says non-smoking section, for a picture and we are on the hunt for one that says no colored allowed and other that says no smokers allowed. for another picture. is this going to be offensive to someone, oh hell yeah it is. but that's the point. so i plan to take it. the fact that it's going to offend someone doesn't bother me. cause for every person i offend i'm sure to make one happy, for taking the stand to do it.

photography is art, no matter the subject matter. and think all the rules of art should also apply. most of my photography class pictures were taken in the local graveyard. why cause i could, and two cause i like the way the old headstones and tombs looked. alot of my freinds family is buried in it. we don't trash it or anything, we take our pictures, have a picnic, sit and chat and be on our way. some times with pulls weeds off people graves and such, so you can read the headstone.

 

Since you started with graveyards, I'll share my experiences.

I love cemeteries and I love tombstones, the older and craggier the better. As a photographer, there are so many opportunities to be found within a cemetery, I'm interested in different styles of tombstones; in my area, there isn't a huge difference in style between ones from the Hanoverian/Victorian period and ones from the Stuart/Tudor era, whereas 20th century memorials differ wildly. If only used as examples of historical art, there is a wealth of material to be found in a cemetery and if you want to share your findings with the world, you're going to have to take a photo...sometimes the memorials are so aged and delicate, you don't want to have a whole crowd tramping down there to see it for themselves.

I don't find taking photographs disrespectful, I find clambering all over graves, stealing flowers laid there and graffiti disrespectful. There is little harm in a straightforward photograph of a grave, a photograph is a non-invasive iconic record of something for cryin' out loud! All it does is prove something exists and I can't for the life of me understand why someone would be offended if someone else photographed their grave. The dead just want to be remembered and there are plenty of abandoned graves out there, where the relatives haven't bothered to go and visit, or the descendants have forgotten or died off themselves.

I wouldn't be impressed if I found someone posing a doll beside a new grave. That leaves you open to a whole minefield of angry descendants, who are only angry because they are grieving and you are doing something trivial with their loved one's grave. With very old graves, I don't really see a problem, as long as the photograph is sympathetic; If you have your Marie Antoinette doll beside a 1660s tombstone, it is sort-of in keeping with the style of the tombstone and if someone happened to see you, I doubt there would be any outrage. If you had some chav dolls lolling about on the older tombstone, passers-by would be more inclined to try and stop you. In this respect I agree very strongly with Armeleia. Appearances and intent is everything.

I satisfy my own interest in gravestone styles with photography, sometimes with appropriate dolls, mostly without, and when I'm done I will 'thank' the grave, by tidying it up. The graves I am usually attracted to are extremely ancient and not looked after. I can tell there are no relatives or descendants to tend or visit these graves because they're almost grown over, and you can hardly see the workmanship of the tombstone. I'll clean off any graffiti left behind by others, I'll cut the grass, give the memorial a wipe down, and my first priority is to clean off the name, so that I know who the memorial belongs to. I feel like because I have taken the time to clean the grave and find out the name of the person who was laid to rest there, the spirit will be satisfied that they are being remembered by at least one person...so they won't mind too much if I take a photo or two

 

I have to wonder what people would think about how in California there is atleast one graveyard that hosts 'movie nights'. People bring their picnic blankets and sit among the graves and watch movies. My sister goes to it regularly. Why? Becuase graveyards have a calming peaceful feel to them that she enjoys.

Ofcourse I'm also amused by people who avoid 'stepping' on the graves. When you mean you avoid stepping on the 'grave marker' only. The coffin is usually far bigger then just the marker on the ground. Avoiding the 'marker' makes sense so it's not damaged, but your still walking over the 'grave'.

I have no problem with people taking pictures of their dolls in graveyards or churches. As long as they do so with respect. Taking photos DURING a funeral, or while an event was occuring in a church would be disrespectful if not disruptive.

I even did take pictures of my doll in a 'fake graveyard'. Why? Because the grey stone was just pretty/artistic.

-Anneke

 

Well, it depends on who you're trying to impact, I guess... and how you are trying to impact them. Are you trying to be offensive by the very act of taking a photograph or are you hoping that the final product will be offensive? If you are not trying to be offensive by taking the photograph and want to end up with an offensive photo, I would expect that you would use a gravestone that you had some connection to - for example, it belongs to a family member. And if you are hoping to offend people by the act of taking the photo... why? Why are you hoping to upset strangers who may already be emotionally raw over the loss of a loved one?

I also think that the impact of doll photographs is rather limited. Taking a photo of a "Colored Only" sign, you are making a political statement about human rights. What statement are you making, exactly, by taking a picture of a doll on someone's grave? And is it a statement that is important enough to you to upset others over?

Making offensive art is a delicate thing. I'm sure that most people can think of several offensive art pieces that have been in the news over the last few years. A cross soaked in urine, the Virgin Mary with elephant dung... that guy in South America who chained up a dog just out of reach of food. One of the problems with making offensive art is that people spend so much time arguing over whether is actually is offensive that the real meaning of the work is often lost. Just on DoA you can see this - someone will post a photoshoot that is inappropriate for a 13+ forum... and even if the pictures are spectacular, the bulk of the comments are about whether the thread is okay, or whether it will be deleted.

 

I wander around graveyards all the time, sometimes to look at who's in there, old stones, or sometimes just for the relaxation. They're usually very decorative & peaceful places. I have family members buried in the Old Salem Burying Grounds in Salem, Mass. Now THERE is a graveyard where people tramp thru, day in & day out, take rubbings, photos, you name it, because of all the famous colonial era personnel buried there, including the Hawthornes, the Mathers Increase & Cotton, Giles Corey the only man pressed to death in the witchcraft trials for refusing to plead (because if he had, he'd have been tried & lost his property), assorted of the judges in those notorious trials, some of the accusing girls, and several other notables of the pre-revolutionary & very early US era. I've frequently been there watching people crawling all over great-great-great-great etc. grandaddy's grave, taking rubbings of Great(x6) Auntie Broomhilda's gravestone (the one with the dancing skeleton), or whomever. It never bothered me one whit, & I'd be willing to bet it doesn't bother Grandpa or Auntie either. I find it rather nice that people still come there in droves to look, or make rubbings, or just walk around. It's a heap better than being abandoned & forgotten, if you're into that sort of thing.

As for photos of dolls in churches or other 'sensitive' places, I think that all depends on circumstances, including what the dolls are being posed doing. If you're shooting doll porn, no: it's not nice & it's not appropriate & I wouldn't recommend it. Otherwise, what's the harm in it? Some churches or monasteries make for superbly beautiful settings, whether for weddings or doll photos, meditations or photoshoots. Unless you're being obtrusive, obnoxious, or doing damage, I doubt the clerics will object. After all, consider the Infant of Prague which used to be so ubiquitous in so many churches, altho you seldom see them anymore: a doll of a toddler, richly dressed in real fabric robes & jeweled crown. That's a doll. And dolls aren't so far from the statues of various saints etc. either. In fact, one of the most treasured things Therese of Lisieux (that's "Saint" Therese to us mere mortals) had before she entered her convent was a doll dressed authentically as a contemplative Carmelite - by the mother Abbess, of all people.

Is it offensive? It 'depends'. Like the supreme court justice, I may not be able to define it, but I know it when I see it at least insofar as it puts MY nose out of joint, yet it may not matter to others because I'm possibly hypersensitive on some particular of the circumstances.

I would say let good taste & common sense be your guide. The bottom line is that there's always somebody who'd going to be offended, no matter how pure or innocent the intent, so do what you want.

And if others object to anybody taking photos of their dolls on their graves, well...go play on my familys', or you can come to mine when I'm planted. I won't object.

 

My apologies for any insult I may have brought upon you by suggesting that you maybe go find a heap of cheap unused materials and expand your creative mind by trying to replicate something that'd work better for your purpose anyway. I will be more careful in the future. In all seriousness, though, it is not that expensive and doesn't take much time at all. I think if anything a doll photographer would want to have a portable graveyard to take with them. If you buy some styrofoam, cut it with a thrift store steak knife, paint it with some $ . 98 spraypaint and stick some pieces of an unused wire coat hanger in it, then you have yourself a portable headstone that can be stuck into grass, snow, dirt, what have you and it took you a whole maybe half hour to make. Make a bunch or make a few in your spare time, maybe buy a few angel statues at the Dollar Tree, go to your backyard or to a park and ta-da! You have yourself a dolly scaled graveyard where you won't offend people! Don't have time? Get off the computer for a while and invest your time in something constructive. You'll find that you may be able to do more with the resources around you than you may have ever imagined. Instead of automatically assuming that someone who suggests a DIY project has a large expendable income, perhaps you ought to think about your possibilities. I work my tail-end off for the money I do have, and even then, I only have all of about $50-100 per month for personal enjoyment. When you're in a position like that, you learn what being thrifty is really all about. Should you wish to continue in rebuttal, I would be more than willing to hear your argument further and present my side via Private Message.

 

Maybe this topic should be changed to "how do you feel about graveyard photoshoots"? ^^; I've yet to see anyone discuss somewhere controversial other than a graveyard/cemetery.

 

Churches have been discussed as well.

 

Actually, I don't. The rare times that I have been in a graveyard, I've been very careful to step very close behind the gravestones, and in between them, since the coffins take up about 6' there. I didn't realize that people would be so, well... Naive is the very best way that I can put it, to think that by not stepping on the stone themselves they aren't standing right over decomposing flesh.


Edit: Also, people HAVE mentioned other areas, but I think that graveyards are the most common. They've mentioned churches and other sacred places, as well as disaster sites-however, I think that we would like to think that most people have the good sense not to bring their doll to Ground Zero and get snap-happy.

 

I tried.

 

Interesting discussion! I personally find graveyards to be peaceful and relaxing. I used to go there all the time when I was little. I loved looking at people's tombstones, wondering what they and their lives were like.

I would be very, very nervous to do a photoshoot in a graveyard. The nervousness comes from pissing off the living friends/family, not disturbing the plots. Some of the people who visited our local graveyard were incredibly distraught. If the tables were turned, and I was the one mourning a relative while some kid comes over to take photos of their doll I would be pissed beyond belief. That doesn't mean I think you can't take pictures in a graveyard. Just that you have to be more careful than normal.

What about other places, like a Zen garden? Some place that is normally used for relaxation and meditation, not photography?

 

I'd love to take some photos of my dolls one day at the place where my father's ashes are buried - it's a tiny country graveyard, in the middle of nowhere. Though small, it is very old, with graves from before the turn of the century right beside ones (like Dad's) that are only a couple of years' passed. So there are lichen-covered wooden crosses only a few paces away from a child's tombstone engraved with a beautiful rendering of Spiderman and decorated with a marble casting of a teddybear. The light and landscape is phenomenal, and in the tiny area there are examples of every type of natural flora in the region, including huge old 'jack' spruce and untouched tallgrass prairie. If you pull in quietly and upwind, there is a chance you will see deer or at least some rabbits. Dad's stone is designed as bench, so people who come have a place to sit and enjoy the peace and beauty of the place, and is engraved with a message inviting them to do so.

Graveyards are places of remembrance and history, though fear of our own mortality or unresolved matters of personal grief often makes people get weird about them. I think it is far better for people to visit and make use of them than to leave them forgotten and ignored.

 

I can understand the strange beauty of an old cemetary, but I find nothing romantic about them. This is possibly for personal reasons that I am sure many of your share but I would be infuriated if I discovered someone photographing my daughters grave. And to the person who said they "really don't care"- I think that's such a sad attitude. I don't care if they are dolls you are posing, or you think the epitaph that loved ones tearfully worded to go on the headstone are "pretty enough for a rubbing", or the flowers we weekly lie beside our loved ones are beautiful- it is not appropriate to use them in your hobby. And, in all this I am refferring to posing your dolls or yourself by a grave just for a random photoshoot.

Brightfires: They are also private property (in the UK atleast) and the plots the graves are on are owned and registered with the land registry. Irregardless of the layout of the cemetaries- they are resting places for the dead, and in the case of recent burials I think it is not on to pose your dolls on them. I certainly wouldn't put up with it and if if I came across you or anyone else doing that on my daughters grave and using "Victorian strolling gardens" as a prissy argument you'd be in for serious trouble.

Anyway' that's my thoughts on the graveyard issue- it hit a very personal nerve of mine (and many others).

As for other places, I think that if you get permission then it isn't really a problem; but I don't want to see pictures of dolls at the remains of the concentration camps, near dead animals or posed anywhere that is more to do with the shocking location rather than the dolls...

 

Dying in a graveyard is a pretty rare thing, so almost no one loses a loved-one in a cemetery, it's just the place where the physical remains are buried. Taking a photograph in a cemetery is not "using dead people as props," or disrespecting the dead because I doubt very much that anyone here has taken a photo of an open grave with a BJD posed on top of a coffin, or inside a coffin nestled beside the deceased

The ancient stone masons who made memorials for the dead were creative enough to make them beautiful. Why shouldn't someone go to a cemetery to admire their handiwork and pay their respects to the dead at the same time? Why try to recreate something in a studio when the real-thing is right there, beautifully crafted, and much better than something someone could knock up in a studio out of plywood and papier mache! Why not just appreciate someone's photograph of a stone mason's wonderful work and simultaneous remembrance of a forgotten grave and praise that creativity?!

I, personally, find most modern memorials quite boring to look at, in the new cemetery locally, the tombstones are identical in height and width and differ only in their inscriptions. You wouldn't catch me in there a) because there isn't anything that attracts me to those headstones and b) new graves = likely mourners. I wouldn't want to impose myself on mourners. Older cemeteries consist of mostly forgotten graves with fantastic designs and beautiful poetic inscriptions, and I don't think I am being disrespectful at all, in fact I am the one there keeping those graves tended when there isn't anyone else to do it.

As for other distasteful/controversial places for dolly photographs...;

1. Holy places; the Western Wall in Jerusalem, the Kaaba in Mecca, Darbar Sahib in Amritsar...etc etc
2. Concentration camps and areas of genocide; Auschwitz-Birkenau in Poland, Murambi School in Rwanda...
3. Sites of local human suffering; Ground Zero in New York, Dunblaine School in Scotland, Columbine High School in Colorado, Omagh in Northern Ireland...
4. Foreign sites of worship; if I'm on a foreign holiday, I tend to steer clear of religious buildings. I know the photography laws in the UK, I can't be sure I'll be something legal in another country.

 

I feel the SAME way. I would be SO upset if someone were using my brother's grave for taking pictures of their hobby... Graveyards are precious and beautiful to me, but I would never take pictures of my dolls there. It's just disrespectful to the departed ones.

 

'Good to know half of the pictures I've ever posted over here are "tacky"...

I'm not a big fan of being "edgy" or intentionally trying to shock people just for the sake of being an attention whore... which is pretty much what I suspect most people who do things like the bondage nun and graveyard porn shoots are going for... but I honestly never have understood why people get so bent out of shape over more innocent pictures taken in graveyards. Particularly the very old ones.

Do they really think the relatives of someone who died in 1840 are going to be emotionally damaged by seeing their distant ancestor's tombstone in a photograph? Do they think the dead care?

People who are loud, who damage the tombstones and who generally act like asses in cemeteries tick me off as much as anyone... maybe even more-so given my historical interest in the places... BUT... I seriously don't see what the big deal is when all you're doing is using the monuments or the landscaping as an attractive backdrop.