Where Fantasy Meets Infrared Photography: Júlia Brümmer

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Brazil-based Júlia Brümmer tells us about her latest project, a fantastical combination between fashion design and photography for which she mixed infrared photography and Lomochrome Purple Film. She also provides us with some great tips about shooting infrared photography yourself.

Hi Júlia! Introduce yourself and your work to the Lomography community.

Hi! My name is Júlia Brümmer. I am a fashion designer, analog photographer, and conceptual storyteller from Brazil. What I’m presenting is my final fashion school project. I’m obsessed with colors and fantasy and... yeah, that’s pretty much it.

How did you get into photography?

Well, I grabbed my first camera when I was around 3, but that doesn’t count, right? I started for real in my teenage years as an escape for some psychological questions. As my disturbances escalated, my interest in photography went through the same rhythm. When I started fashion school, I also felt the need to express my thoughts about stuff that bothered me a lot (like the typical fashion body type standards) in a different way than just having a conversation, ‘cause you know, pictures speak louder than words. Everything exploded – in a good way – when I decided to migrate from digital to analog and here we are, five years of only shooting film and nowadays, I also am an analog photography teacher. After all of those experiences, I concluded that my point is communication and artisanal fashion photography is my tool.

Júlia's project illustrations. © Júlia Brümmer

Tell about your project and where it stemmed from.

So first of all, I had to speak with people from every part of the world to collect information, because the fields that I was exploring were poorly investigated and there weren't many bibliographic references about it (this also includes spending all the money I had on 35mm infrared film in an auction in the USA not even knowing if it was real infrared film, but we’ll talk more about photography later). I reunited everything that is important for me and the general proposal was to develop a micro-conceptual fashion collection. It has five looks and one of them was executed as the prototype. I based myself in the following subjects:

  • Fantastic art: This is an area of art that encompasses all the creative representations in the history of humanity that break the limits of reality. I analyzed the work of two guys: Luigi Serafini, who developed the Codex Seraphinianus and Hieronymus Bosch, a renaissance painter that showed delicacy in chaotic themes, such as hell. I crossed information from both and absorbed the concept that I needed (this part also inspired me for the creation of the drawings).
  • Fashion history: As I was graduating school for fashion design, I went to study the Queen Elizabeth I and her habits, then crossed elements of XIX century fashion.
  • Analog photography: What else would I use to photograph my project, right? I did some explanation about the history, the methods, and some criticism the massification of the digital image industry and then of course, entered in the vortex of infrared media.
  • Sustainability and feminism: I got my finger on the wounds of slave labor, massive industry processes, pollution, lack of attention to quality and detail, body dictatorships and sexism. My prototype and all the elements of production were mostly built with reused or scrap materials. My central model is read and self described as a fat woman, she is deaf. The two are an Afro-Brazilian model and a descendant of a Brazilian indigenous 
nation.
Photographs taken with the Lomochrome Purple from Júlia's project. © Júlia Brümmer

These photos have such a unique look to them. What did you use to achieve this look and what did you learn about photography/yourself while using these different materials?

As I said, color is my thing and I wanted to dive deep into that for my final graduation project. Photographically speaking, I had something that caught my eye a long time ago and when I noticed I felt into the rabbit hole, I just knew that it was time for me to try it. I’m referring of course to infrared photography.

Before I even begin, I should say that it wouldn’t be possible for me to create such intricate and detailed work without the help of some angels. First, I have to thank Mr. Dean Bennici (the one and only supplier in the world of the infamous infrared films). His work is unbelievable. He taught me everything about the IR spectrum and how to understand the color shifting processes (his wife is also an extremely talented creator). Mr. Aldo Altamirano (the Argentinian photographer who transformed Central Park into an infra wonderland), Radka Smolíková (an incredible Lomographer -@smolda- and the sweetest person on earth), and my dear friend Thiago Nagasima (photographer and the answer to any photographic problem you might have). They were also my salvation.

Infrared test shot vs. how colors appeared in real life. © Júlia Brümmer

Well, I have a lot of stories about this project and if I go into detail about the whole process, we'll be talking forever, so I'll do my best to make it a little bit short. Infrared is the most amazing media that I have used so far, but it is also a walking nightmare to handle. Sensitivity is a real problem here. It's necessary that the camera used is 100% manual because electronic cameras have sensors that emit a small radiation that causes fogging on this type of film. The material needs to be opened and processed in full darkness and manually because Minilab machines also disperse radiation. You have to use lens filters that block the visible spectrum so that the infrared waves are filtered. The films cannot come in contact with any type of X-ray equipment to avoid corruption and they must be constantly cooled. It's like taking care of a little baby.

The answer for the aesthetic is that infrared films capture a type of wave frequency present in the electromagnetic spectrum that is not seen with the naked eye. IR reacts to heat and according to how the surface being photographed reacts chemically too, a specific color scale is generated; green foliage turns into magentas and reds, the skies go from light blue to pitch black, our pinkish lips turn into yellow, and so on (and all of that also depends on the intensity and angulation of the sun rays). I focused on this phenomenon with textiles, so I developed a scheme of color-changing based on different compositions (polyester, cotton, leather, etc) so I could choose which fabric colors to use to get the desired palette in the photos.

How IR affects color in photographs. © Júlia Brümmer

The original infrared color films (such as Kodak Aerochome Infrared Film 1443 and Kodak Ektachrome EIR) were discontinued due to the cost of production involved, but luckily our dear Lomography launched the beautiful Lomochromes and I wanted to pay homage to the purple and turquoise films (and also to fulfill the editorial storytelling), so I did the same scheme for them. For the Aerochrome pictures, I used an Olympus OM-2 with a G.Zuiko 1.4 lens + a yellow #12 Tiffen filter (processed in E-6). For the Lomochrome ones, I used my everyday Yashica 108 Multi Program with a UV filter (processed in C41). I can certainly say that the greatest lesson was not just absorbing so much information about an extra creative and little explored area today, but it was the fact that challenges like this remind me constantly that I can go way further than I imagine. After the project was over, I sent the photos to Mr. Karl Ferris, who is the photographer from Jimi Hendrix's “Are You Experienced?” album cover. He left only a "seen" signal displayed in the message, but as an emerging photographer, this was the coolest thing ever in my career so far.

What did you learn about yourself while working on this? How did this project help you personally?

I discovered the maturity of my repertoire of photographic taste. Ever since I was a child, I have been a sensitive person in every aspect. In the beginning of the research (when unraveling the reference between Serafini and Bosch), I spent almost three months analyzing all the representations I could find that art gave us about hell. It is undeniable that this impacts your our emotional dynamics. Those are very dense representations that end up influencing the perception we put into our work, but I believe I managed to draw interesting inspirations from this deep dive into the chaos. It was, although, a painful journey. Looking beyond this entire experience, I consider my mind my little treasure where I can walk through, as if it were a large archive, in which I can select, pick and choose if you will. Elements that build up my unique form of creating.

Infrared photographs from Júlia's project. © Júlia Brümmer

I believe that, beyond amazing possibilities that creative photography can give us to conceive amazing projects, the final message is that we have to talk more and more about mental health, because it will never be enough. I feel that people with the same mind configuration as mine are often treated as intellectually fragile beings, and we are not. Art is one of the best channels to hug who is out of the norm and in this case, photography is the creative bridge.
I understand that it is urgent that governments around the world should provide and spread more information and involvement on this topic. Mental illnesses are still surrounded by a bunch of myths and the simple truth is that people need support, love and empowerment so that we are not eternally trapped in a position of victims of conditions that only make us beautifully unique (and I should also say capable of doing amazing good for the world). Education is the key.

What can we expect to see from you in the future?

A LOT OF COLOR BABE. Keep it weird.


Keep up with more of Júlia's work on Instagram.

written by sragomo on 2018-11-05 #people #infrared #lomochrome-purple

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3 Comments

  1. smolda
    smolda ·

    @juliabrummer ♥♥♥ You are the bravest, girl!!! Your work is amazing! :*
    And it was a pleasure to help you, at least that tiny bit I could! ♥ :)

  2. beblo
    beblo ·

    I do not know if my comment here will reach her?
    There is a man on television during the 1980s, he always give this advice on their program:
    "If you have tried everything else in life, but still failed? Why don't you try, Jesus Christ."

  3. lafilledeer
    lafilledeer ·

    Wow, brilliant !

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