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Too much, too young?

To continue with my theory there will be a series of photograph’s of girls and women at different ages throughout their life, the younger girls will be shown at points on their life where they are already trying to be older than they are. The older women will be captured trying to be more youthful. I have already started to develop this concept last year with young girls aged between 10 and 13.

“ It’s taken for granted these days that children aren’t what they were. They are, thanks to the creation of the tween advertising market, more sharply aware of self-image.”

Emma Brockes, The Guardian

This part of the project is ‘Too Much, Too Young?’ A social documentary photographic essay; commenting on the pressures young girls face as they are growing up. The mass media have been criticising retailers, celebrities and parent’s for allowing children to be over-sexualised and exploited. Are children discovering too much, too young?

This work has already been exhibited and I found the public response very interesting, there was a certain uneasy feeling from some viewers but also an understanding that this is how girls feel in today’s society. To develop my concept and complete it through various ages of girls and women would be a fulfilling ambition of mine.

Too much, too young?

I am intrigued as to why girls may want to be older and women younger, is there a peer pressure put on women in today’s society to be youthful? Do young girls think that being older is going to be more fulfilling and exciting? Is there an ideal age and if so what is it?

I have started researching this with a Video Art piece I have produced previously for a BBC big screen commission. ‘What age would you like to be?’, where I asked various girls and women what age they would like to be, I found that the majority of young girls wanted to be older and older women wanted to be younger.