Petra Collins

 'The Teenage Gaze' by Petra Collins; photo series hopes to shed some light by showing life through the eyes of young girls as adolescents often feel misrepresented and misunderstood. When being a teenager there is always that sense of waiting for something. Teenage years are often glamorised with passion, sex and discovery- which can be true in some cases. But in between this excitement there's often a lot of waiting around.  'Waiting for a lift, waiting for your friends to get ready, waiting to be legally allowed to buy alcohol, waiting for someone to have a crush on you.' These images by Collins, capture the sheer drawn-out nature of teenage years.
The Teenage Gaze is quite powerful in a the sense it is not obvious what Collins is trying to represent, it forces viewers to think deep into her image. It hints at both the good and bad parts of a person's glory day in as real a way as possible, which are often termed the best days of your lives, in a real and gritty fashion- spots, car journeys, limo and just hanging around. From smoking to gossiping and roaming the halls of school, the scenes are arresting. The documentary work are through a beautifully artistic and raw narrative, with no air brushing or a set up. The idea that adolescence in today's society is disapproved because it includes 'drinking and smoking' can be hard to adjust to when it surrounds most teenagers today. 

This is precisely the teenagers of the 21st century, the idea of always waiting for things and not having the courage to do it in that moment. The involvement of 'waiting' is a big issue for any teenager but there have been various different issues relating to 'what' teenagers wait, for example the idea of self diagnosis. Teenagers of now have been prone to giving them self an illness or disorder and the idea of 'waiting' to be told by a medical expert that it's true or not.  

Image Analysis:

 The image of the 'girl next door' wearing a tiara. That would be an ordinary caption of the image however, this 'girl next door' is wanting to be a princess perhaps. Her dreams are too surreal but she can still try to achieve them. The first thing that caught my eye when I seen this image was her eye, and the brown colour it was and how it was curled, which held the tiara which I focused on after. The tiara is evidently the main subject because it what we assume the image is about from. The emotional effect it has on the view is strange because it could go two ways; the idea of being aspirational or the idea of hoping for what won't happen. The way her eyes are locked on to the centre is showing that 'waiting for something to happen' that Collin's aimed to show. It makes a social comment as well how, teenage girls of today want to be 'that princess' one day. By 'that princess' I mean the one's in Disney Films perhaps. The use of a simple white background doesn't distract us from the main subject but keeps the image pure as that is what white symbolises. The image is a portrait but taken in landscape getting the broader angle of the image. Collin's has been effortless in her composition as the image has cut off top of tiara which could also show how in adolescence individual's don't care 'too' much. 

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