Studio

Finally starting to develop a cohesive folio, I've found that printing images - regardless of how refined/relevant they are to my final concept, helps me get a grip on which stage of development my work is at, and in which direction I feel I should lean as I go. Note to future self: Stop thinking about it and just print it! Pin it up and move it around and tear it down in frustration if it helps... just get it out of your head and onto paper so you can hold something real in your hand!

Memories Lost and Broken

Artist Statement

Memories Lost and Broken is a series that draws on the fragmented nature of memory, and the feeling of nostalgia that is often associated with a frustration at not being able to clearly grasp a passed moment in its entirety. There are always gaps, blank spaces and shadows in our subconscious that may be irretrievable, and for this reason these photographs are drenched in darkness and the solid, impenetrable black of forgetfulness. The six objects have been selected by each of the six people photographed, as representation of a time or memory personal to them. The viewer may sense a vague familiarity in relating to the objects, but cannot quite access their true meaning or correctly match them to the face to which they belong. In this sense, Memories Lost and Broken also makes a comment on photographic representation. No matter how perfectly a surface may be transcribed by the camera, true understanding of a person's history or an object's personal importance will always drop away into the gap between real and representation. A viewer’s inclination is to invent these unknown histories, and so they too become an active part of the artwork. Perhaps it is best to be satisfied with the beauty in not knowing, and to allow the familiar yet inaccessible sense of nostalgia and Déjà vu wash over you as darkness washes over these fragmented memories.

Image Selection

Here are some photographs I've been taking in the studio, there are hundreds of them so I've only chosen a small selection. For my finals I will be choosing 12 to print: 6 people and 6 objects which will be paired but them shuffled around like our memories often are. I want the connections between each pair to be unclear to the viewer - they may try to guess at which memory belongs to which face but in the end a photography can only tell us so much about a person's emotion, history, thoughts etc. This is what I wish to outline.

Some photos like the two shown here (headphones and dvd) are very clearly photographed with quite a high exposure compared to some others. Though these are perhaps better photos is the formal sense, I think they lose a lot of the nostalgia and mystery which some other objects hold in their shadows and the dropping out of focus which sometimes occurs as objects disappear into the black. I probably won't be using these two photos for this reason and also because although they were chosen by two models I photographed, their associations with technology and the future might overwhelm the nostalgic mood I am trying to create, diverting the themes of my final series down an unintended path!

This photo exemplifies the fading into darkness I was speaking of - though the features which are lit are clearly that of a face, you lose a lot of the person to darkness and I think this is reminiscent of the confusion often associated with memory: we can never remember the entire thing but only fragments. To create this effect I have used a few light sources: window light and tungsten as this was not shot in the studio. However all light sources were positioned on the one side of the model's face and so although there is dimension in the lighting there is also that blacking out of the left side.

Fragmentation and Nostalgia

Two photos I have taken for photomedia Project 2 (a and possibly b)
looking at the brokenness of memory, the impossibility of truth in memory, and in photography. Difficulties in language and art to fully capture the essence of a memory or a thought. The assumptions we make of objects' surfaces, of the photographic 'mask'.
I want to test the 'truth' of photographic reality by encouraging the viewer to connect each fragmented portrait with a fragmented memory - which memory belongs to which person? How can we possibly know that?