Twitter has a set layout, so the two twitter accounts feel very similar in terms of proportions.
Bruce Gilden’s profile picture shows more personality as he is posing in a fun position however Mark Power has a profile picture where his head fills the majority of the space with him looking off into the distance. Power’s profile picture seems more professional than Gilden’s however I am more intrigued and drawn in by Gilden’s profile picture; I wonder if that is one of the reasons why more people follow Gilden. Both provide a banner photo that is one of their own photographs, giving people an insight into the type of photography they do and therefore lets the viewer have a quick idea as to whether or not they are interested in this artist’s work. As the world tends to have a short attention span when it comes to social media, a lot of people will judge this photo before they scroll down to see any more, Gilden’s banner photo is more striking as the black and white image stands out, there is also a sense of contrast with the banner photo and the profile photo, the profile photo is far away and in colour and the banner photo is in greyscale and is close up of two men. However, Power’s banner photograph makes me curious, I want to learn more as to why this photo is here, why is this important? The profile picture and the banner photo also seem to work better together than Gilden’s I believe this is because of the similar colour pallet and saturation.
They both have their location of where they are based, this provides some cultural context. They both also provide a link to their own websites, giving people an option to find out more about them as photographers as well as view their work. Power has “Photographer.” As his biography whereas Gilden’s written biography says: “I joined Magnum Photos in 1998 and became a full member in 2002. IG: http://instagram.com/bruce_gilden | Print sales/inquiries: [email protected]” Gilden has used this section to his advantage by sharing the agency he is a part of, Magnum Photos, even though Power is also a member of Magnum Photos, he has not used his twitter platform to inform his followers and potential followers. Gilden is also promoting his Instagram and an email for people to use if they are interested in purchasing prints or any other enquiries. Even though Power has an Instagram he hasn’t used this opportunity to promote it as Gilden has. Overall, Gildens written biography reads more professional and utilizes the opportunity to have more people follow his other social media account as well as selling his prints, while Power’s feels very limited in comparison.
Gilden has used the pinned tweet function, so that when you visit his twitter account, this is the first tweet you see, making it more prominent as more people are likely to see it. This tweet is promoting his book with Gucci and provides a link to an article about this book. A great use of the platform to help spread information of projects. Power does not have a pinned tweet.
Both Power and Gilden don’t post frequently on twitter, less than once a month on average, however if I just look at from now to 2019, Power has a lot more tweets than Gilden. Gilden’s tweets are mostly retweets (sharing another accounts tweet) rather than posting an original tweet, he tweeted two original tweets in 2020 and two in 2019 whereas most of Power’s posts are his own original tweet, making his account feel more personalized so that when you follow him, it feels as though there is a closer connection to him as an artist as we learn about his thought and opinions. Gilden’s tweets on the over hand, are mostly updates and links to articles, this is informative but doesn’t have that personal element found in Power’s. This is interesting as if I just looked at the profile picture, banner photo and biography I would have guessed that the more personal tweets would come from Gilden instead of Power.
In 2019 Power used twitter like Instagram where he had tweets that showed a photo and included text to inform us of the location and date of the photograph. This asks the question why not just use Instagram where people are more likely to want to see photographs? At first I thought, maybe he didn’t have Instagram, however I found out that he did, and I then realized it might have been a tactic to try and get more followers on twitter as he currently has 81.2k followers on Instagram and 8,702 followers on twitter, if this is the case then it clearly did not have the desired effect and Power has stopped taking this approach on his twitter account for the time being.
Overall, I believe Twitter is a good platform to share links related to professional work, for example if an article is written about an exhibition, I am involved in. I also think twitter is a good platform to let people know of upcoming exhibitions and other opportunities to view and support my work. Due to twitter being a limited platform, there is only so much to do with it, and there is a limit to how many characters you can use in one post, so tweets have to be concise and to the point, furthering my opinion that twitter is good for announcements and sharing links, giving the followers a chance to learn and find out more. However, twitter is seen as a negative social media platform. People tend to be more negative online, as it is easier to be mean and spiteful behind an anonymous identity, people will vent their anger and frustrations on social media, this seems to be more prominent on Twitter. Therefore, if I were to get a twitter account to build my social media presence, I would keep it very professional and use it as an aid to keep people informed and updated of where and when they can see my artwork and any links related to my practice, similar to how Gilden uses his twitter account.
