Assignment 5 Context & Narrative

Link to images

Please note that the link above is a second submission following feedback from Andrew Conroy. The first submission can be seen here.  You will note that some of the things I mention below describe how I felt about the first set of images I submitted.

(These sets of images are password protected.)

I wanted to do something for A5 that continued the story I think I have been trying to tell since starting this course.  The previous assignments ended up being very much about coming to terms with a new paradigm, as well as some introspection; trying to figure out how I tick, why and what led me to this point in my life.  I knew I wanted to turn outwards at this juncture, having done quite a lot of self portraiture. Not only because it felt somewhat narcissistic but also because I felt it was the right time to stop looking inwards quite so much.

One of my ideas was to extend something I was doing already, photographing my local area. Although I did not do this for the course the result is a set of images that I printed and exhibited in a local cafe, and have sold several prints. You can view these here and there is some research here. They are images mostly of walls but not all.

The other thing I was really interested in was prisons.  But I learnt that since I was not in any way established with a body of work behind me, I wouldn't have a cat's chance in hell getting in to any prisons.  I have very recently come across Amy Elkins' work where she got round the problem of not being able to enter a prison by writing to prisoners on death row and working collaboratively with them that way.  The results of several years' work can be seen here.

I am also in retrospect interested in the symbolism of 'prison' walls and what it was about that made me consider this as a possibility.

After chatting with Andrew Conroy and dismissing some ideas, I eventually settled on documenting a family, which is an idea I've had for a while, and since I already sometimes take family portraits it felt like a good focus. However, this didn't seem to lead on neatly from the work I'd done already for TAOP, so in the end I decided to use my own family which felt like a natural and sensible progression.

I chose a regular holiday in Italy at my mother's house.  Apart from the practical reasons I thought that photographing from a place that is very much about my mother would be a useful exercise.

In A4 I looked at object identification from the point of view of a developing infant.  The first object being the mother (actually her breasts and then her).  It takes some time for the infant to recognise the self as a different object to the mother and how this process unfolds informs further object recognition.

So, by looking at my mother's space and at the people in my mother's space I think I was perhaps going back to that place - a place where mother and baby are not quite separate -  in order to try and reframe the process of separation, somehow taking control it it myself.  Marriane Hirsh certainly discusses how photographers use their work to rewrite their internal narratives in Family Frames.

But such work can also be used to explore and discover and I think I have tried to do that here.  I look at these photographs and see a fragile mother who washes and cleans and looks after my children for me.  She is involved in the family and she is sad when we leave, although exhausted as I do so little whilst I am there, leaving all the the 'mothering' to her.

I have made sure all the images are inside the house.  I have deliberately kept inside my mother's house as these images are about me looking and seeing from some part within her.  Is it about trying to identify with her, to try and understand some of our history.  I very consciously chose to do this - keeping inside always and editing to ensure everything was seen from within her thick Italian stone walls, built to withstand earthquakes.

At this point I think about my initial ideas - scenes from my local area which ended up as a series of images that are mostly of walls and one in particular of a window with the word Mum placed across it, and then the other idea - prison.  And it's difficult for me not to make connections and links.  The images I use are inside my mother's house - not outside.   I wonder if I have been exploring my way of seeing, which is somehow 'imprisoned' inside the metaphorical walls built with the history I have with my mother, impacting on my life in a profound way.  Somehow I am trapped inside these 'internal and maternal prison walls' and there is a desire in me to understand, record and explore that, and certainly to break out of that. (Perhaps this contradicts an earlier post about the other work - I don't see why both interpretations aren't valid however.)

Regardless of what I thought the images might be suggestive of, my mother felt that I must hate her when she saw one of the images. There are two in particular at the end which are not flattering photographs and in many ways very unkind.  The photographs I refer to are definitely not vanity shots and I did warn her that she would not like them. I think about how I would feel to have such photographs of me 'out there' and I don't suppose I would very much.  In fact I'd be quite upset.  I have talked about it elsewhere so don't want to go into it too much in this document.

Her reaction was utterly understandable and had made me think about how photographers, especially those exploring difficult human depths and emotions, such as mental illness, age, and frailty, approach sensitive subjects.

I think about my approach and compare it to Jim Mortram's - he gets to know the people in his work and checks in on them continually, finding a way to record their worlds without intruding on them.   They share something of themselves with him.  Many of his images are of people in a vulnerable state.  He works collaboratively.  I, however, took the image of my mother and used it to communicate something about me.  It is not a collaborative exercise for me.

I wanted to use these images but in the end I am not entirely at ease about making my mother feel uncomfortable.  I wondered if I should use the series but cover the ones with her in them with a black mask therefore mimicking the SA newspapers during the state of emergency as mentioned in my post about The Bang Bang Club.  I don't think this would have been the right thing to do though - she is not after all an authoritarian state. It would however have expressed a certain sense of authentic rage, I'm sure.

I also thought about submitting an entirely different edit which was colourful rather than black and white, but suggested a sense of alienation and separateness, which would have been authentic too but abstract.  Since I have already submitted some quite abstract work I think it would serve me better to submit something more tangible.  Although, I must say, the more I look at the two edits, I do prefer this coloured one.  I think it lacks anything of a 'Freudian Family Romance' and is far truer and more reflective of my reality within those walls.

In the end I am going to the use the black and white images, despite my mother's distress, because the narrative is clear, albeit a romanticised one.  However I will submit them privately, using a password. Other students whom I have met are welcome to have the password.  (Following feedback from AC I changed from back and white to colour and have explained why in the feedback post I wrote)

I do feel that by doing so (opting for B&W as I originally did) I am making a compromise which I'm not entirely happy with, I have to say. But I also realise that this is an exercise at the end of course for a university and not my 'big work' if ever such a thing were to materialise.  It has been a stepping stone and I have learnt from it, but I must end this module and make a decision about which one to do next.  So that is how I am going to end it otherwise I could think about what to do forever.  It is quite hard to let go of for some reason.

I have not used any words with the images (following feedback I have now used words although am still not entirely happy with them at all).  I would like them (the images) to speak for themselves.  I have not put them into a book here (although I have prepared one if that is recommended - which it was and so am now supplying that along with the blog for submission).  I think that might detract from the images and make the exercise about something other than the story I hope they tell.

I chose black and white because there is a type of crystalisation in the images, a freezing of time, which feels more frozen without colour.  The colour edit I nearly used seems far more vibrant.  I can almost hear the cicadas and the silent buzzing or humming of the empty spaces as I went about photographing them.  But I don't get that in black and white.  By removing the colour I feel like I have removed the life and left only shadows and impressions.  I know of course this is all in my own perception and interpretation but that is how it felt.  I might actually prefer the colour edit personally, but the one I'm submitting expands on the type of work I'm submitting for assessment.

The blog post about Family Frames is the main supporting material although all the other links and reviews on the A5 entry page have salient points in too.  However, I have linked back to posts on this page which I hope expand on ideas I've introduced in these paragraphs.  I have deliberately tried to keep this entry as clear and clean as possible, speaking with my own voice and using my own words.

Images can be found here and will need a password which will be supplied to Andrew Conroy and the assessors.  I am happy as I say to share this link with the small number of fellow students whom I have met on study visits, privately or at the Thames Valley meet.  Please email me if you are interested.



Demonstration of technical skills
I am more adept in Lightroom than I am with a camera but that is changing the more I work and get to grips with equipment.  I panic less when things don't go right and find ways to fix them or use alternative methods.  I like to experiment with composition and enjoy looking at other photographers to find inventive ways of composing that challenge the run of the mill.  Sometimes I'm successful with this and other times less so.  At this point the willingness to experiment is a good thing I think.

Quality of outcome
I think some of the photographs demonstrate a good degree of lighting, light use, composition, and story telling.  There is a mood in the series that is translated effectively.  I am torn within myself about using other ways of presenting the images and am still thinking about how I might do this more creatively. I know other students put things in films and on YouTube for instance.  It's very effective and I know works well.  But I'm wary of it - content rather than form is more important to me at this stage.  But I also think about how music and filmic editing can manipulate emotion and I think I'd hesitate to go down that route - a possible mawkishness is not what I'm after with these images.  I also think about Brecht and how he wanted his audience to think rather than be overwhelmed with emotion.  I do not know whether or not to present the Blurb book (which I have prepared) for assessment or to simply submit the online images. I need to think about how I present all the sets from TAOP in a cohesive package.

Demonstration of creativity
I feel like the the last series, on the surface at any rate, looks the least 'creative' in comparison to A3 &A4, but only because it is a quieter, less showy set of images.  I do feel my 'voice' has developed and continues to do so.  I look forward to finding more creative and imaginative ways of working, perhaps playing with some of the ideas I've discovered by looking at other photographers over the course.

Context
I am certain my context and reflection is of a high standard and enjoy this part of the course very much.  I look forward to developing these skills as I take on another module and my youngest son starts school, freeing up more time.  I suspect my research needs to develop some sort of academic rigour but that will come the higher up the levels I go.  I could have written about more influences such as Ray's a Laugh for instance but at the time of writing this I have not.  Perhaps by the time I submit for assessment I will have done but I needed to draw a line under this and think about moving on at some point.

The Bang Bang Club by Greg Marinovich & Joao Silva

I read The Bang Bang Club quite a few years ago, long before I became interested in photography, and found it utterly compelling although harrowing.  The fact that I had grown up in SA where most of it takes place, and that the photographers worked at The Star newspaper where my mother and step-father were journalists might have made the book fascinating in itself but it is also well written and extremely moving.

I read it again last year (while I was probably meant to be reading the dreaded Sontag book).  I am writing about it now because I think it raises several important points about ethics of, and voyeurism in, photography.

The Bang Bang Club is written by surviving members of a group of photographers who worked during the troubling and extremely violent years following Nelson Mandela's release from prison and before he became president.  We left SA in 1986 when I was 16 and Mandela hadn't yet been released; not until 1990. Those intervening four years and the ones after his release saw the violence escalate to barbaric levels. However, it had certainly started in force before we left.  I do remember hearing about the necklacing, where someone is put inside a tyre filled with fuel and burnt alive when I was a young teenager living in Jo'burg.  The violence was undoubtably one of the things that made us return to the UK.

Because of my mother's job, I knew in the years before we left that much was not reported fully or at all.  The Star and other centre and left wing papers got around restrictions imposed by the ruling National Party by leaving huge gaps across newspapers where column inches should have contained text and images, but instead contained just a few words along the lines of 'due to the State of Emergency we cannot print this story/photograph' or, simply, 'This article has been censored'.  The lack of information, the absence of print, said a great deal, not only about the violence but also about the government and what the editors of those newspapers thought about the censorship.

Ken Oosterbroek, Kevin Carter, Greg Marinovich and Joao Silver worked at a time in SA when the boundaries of a didactic and authoritarian state were being violently dismantled.  They witnessed and photographed some shocking things, young people murdered by angry mobs using machetes, necklacing as well as shootings.  They did not hold back from photographing the most disturbing scenes, and the book looks at the opposing tensions they all felt in their jobs.  They wanted to record what was going on, not only the sickening treatment of the black population but also the fighting between the Xhosa and Zulu factions.

In order to fulfil these assignments they all had to find ways of coping.  Emotional detachment, propped up with alcohol and drugs led to problems for each of them.  But the most tragic was Kevin Carter who shortly after receiving a Pulitzer prize for his photograph of a vulture sitting behind a starving child committed suicide.  I have to say when I look at photographs of him I imagine I see the frailty in his expression and gestures, and his eventual suicide does not seem surprising given the trauma photographing such scenes must have had on all of them.  Not only were they witness to truly shocking scenes, they each had to come to terms with the fact they had witnessed these things without intervening, choosing instead to take photographs.

The moral implications are are not clear cut.  It was of course imperative the world outside of Soweto and other townships were aware of what was going on and photography has the capacity to share stories at a very immediate and visceral level. There is something about images being pre-verbal, and maybe therefore capable of 'speaking' to our emotions in a very different way to words (sure there is a dissertation in that sentence but I'll have to expand another time).  And had anyone intervened they would very likely have been killed. As it was each of them risked their lives each time they ventured out, some were indeed shot and recovered, but Ken Oosterbroek was shot dead in a gun battle shortly before Carter's suicide.  So, although the moral implications might be difficult, there is no denying their immense bravery in telling stories about atrocities and telling them from as close to the centre of it all as you can be.

The authors explore this dilemma, about how complicit they were by the fact they were present at all, choosing to photograph what was going on.  I am not sure that even they are always a hundred percent convinced by their arguments. "I was one of the circle of killers, shooting with a wide-angle lens just an arm's length away, much too close", says Marinovich when describing one of his first encounters with gang murder close-up, and "I was as aware of what I was doing as a photographer as I was of the scent of fresh blood, and the stench of sweat from the men next to me."

But the authors also say that if the pictures of atrocities exist they should be seen. "To censor pictures that are too strong, indecent or obscene was to make decisions for the reader that was not theirs to make."

In the end photographers have to try to live with themselves, whatever they choose to shoot. Kevin Carter describes how the trauma affected him and the authors agree they all felt the same at times.

"I suffer depression from what I see and experience nightmares.  I feel alienated from 'normal' people, including my family.  I find myself unable to relate or engage in frivolous conversation.  The shutters come down and I recede into a dark place with dark images of blood and death in godforsaken dusty places."

Carter's image of the little girl and the vulture caused uproar as well as praise.  People wanted to know what happened to the child, why had he not helped, how could he have taken a photograph of a child suffering like that rather than dropped his camera and run to pick her up, did the vulture take the child.  He gave vague and contradictory answers.  The reality is he had been working, looking for a story, and Marinovitch describes a probable quotidian and emotionally detached scenario that took place.  All those questions by all accounts put an incredible amount of pressure on a man who had always struggled mentally.  The intense focus on him and his photograph, the emotional difficulties witnessing so much extreme violence must have caused him, cannabis (or daga as it is know in SA) and cocaine all contributed to eventual serious clinical depression.  After he lost some rolls of film for Time magazine he was found dead with a pipe leading from his exhaust to the inside of his car.

Ultimately the elections took place and the four journalists had documented, at enormous cost to themselves, an incredibly important process where human beings were as vile as they can possibly be to each other.  You can see some of the images Kevin Carter photographed here, including the first photograph of a necklace killing which is so shocking and utterly horrifying to think about.  It is of course critical that these actions by humans against other humans are recorded and shared.  Who does it though and how is another matter.

The book is really worth reading whether you're interested in photography, journalism, even South African history or not.  It is written with an admirable honesty and sense of humility, a retelling of a moment that must have been extraordinarily painful to revisit at times.

Quotes from The Bang Bang Club by Greg Marinovich & Joao Silva Random House Books 2001

Saul Leiter

I came across Saul Leiter via a Twitter connection and ended up watching a wonderful documentary called In No Great Hurry about him.  Apart from the fact that Saul Leiter comes across as a genuinely remarkable and kind person, I absolutely fell in love with his photography.

Saul Leiter was the son of a rabbi and was expected to follow the same path but he abandoned his studies and went to New York at the age of 24 to pursue art.  He was a painter who started using a Leica after being encouraged, and eventually became a fashion photographer.  He became part of what is known as the New York School and was working at the same time as other well known photographers in New York from that era, such as Diane Arbus (he took a portrait of her) and Robert Frank.  He used colour film when it was unusual to do so and his colour street photography is incredibly distinctive and beautiful.

I love his street photography and now have a copy of his book, Early Colour.  You can really see the knowledge he gained as a painter in his photographs and I think his work might be timeless for that reason.  He mediates what he sees and transforms seemingly simple quotidian scenes into something very beautiful.  He is not as well known as some of the other big names from that time but that is changing and I think his work has a quality that will endure.  His style is incredibly expressive and I wonder if a lot of people are emulating (perhaps without realising) what he used to do on various online platforms today.

The colour prints I have looked at explore colour, shapes, reflections and blurred scenes, all of which he uses to create small masterpieces that to my eye will be worth looking at for many, many years going forward.  Saul Leiter was born in 1923 and died in 2013.  Anyone interested should certainly see the film I mention at the top.  It's beautifully made and he is wonderful to listen to.  His lack of grandiosity, his low key modesty, his  kindness and the appreciation of his all the good as well as all the sadness from life is wonderful to witness.

Wikipedia
Guardian

Exercise: Rain

Imagine a magazine cover on one subject: rain.  You have the entire cover space to work with and you should produce a single, attractive, strong photograph that leaves no one in doubt about the subject.

Rain (c)SarahJaneField 2015

This was taken on my iPhone 5c using Camera+ and then edited in Snapseed.  I darkened it and increased the contrast plus sharpened and increased the structure, then turned it upside down so the reflection of the building appeared the right way up.  I hope it leaves no one in any doubt about the subject.

Family Frames - Unconscious Optics, Seeing, Screens

I am still making my way through the book, Family Frames.  Its a very difficult book and I should no doubt have read a couple of other key texts before trying to tackle this one.  Although what it has done for me is made me very eager to go back and finish Sontag's On Photography which has sat languishing on my chest of draws for months abandoned a third of the way through.  I must also tackle Ways of Seeing,  I know.  Nevertheless, I am enjoying what I can in Family Frames and am intrigued and excited by unconscious optics.

Hirsh explains that we look at flat pictures which have the illusion of depth, that we see them through multi-layers of screens such as religion, culture, personal history, romantic illusions - but that photographs are a slice of an unconscious moment.  And being so offer up details we would otherwise not see.  I remember discussing how I am beginning to enjoy photography as it lets me know what is going on with me at an unconscious or semi-conscious level.  In the same way the minute physical details which can be seen in Muybridge's horses.  Photographs also show us the minute psychological details of our lives; thoughts, interests, moods.  Things that are wholly or partially hidden by consciousness.

Jung talks about becoming enlightened by making the unconscious conscious, and that includes becoming aware of the darkest aspects of ourselves.  Photography seems to offer a way of enabling that need.

I am also thrilled to read about screens.  When I started looking at different cultural childrearing practises I remember thinking it doesn't matter how many books are written about this methodology or that one - people will gravitate towards the ideologies that fit with their own personal outlook on life, be those outlooks conscious or otherwise.  Many of mine were not conscious when I first had a child.  I had a totally unrealistic view of who I am and was utterly uninformed and unaware about myself.  Having children unravelled and unearthed parts of me that I had no idea about, and I am happy to say I was pleasantly surprised by some of what came to the surface but also horrified later by other less easy to live with aspects of myself.  Photography is doing the same thing.  And I am reading how photography is also looked at by individuals and societies through ideologies that are conscious and unconscious; screens.

"Looking occurs in the interface between the imaginary and the symbolic.  It is mediated by complex cultural, historical, and social screens."

However, she goes on to say;

"Photographs may capture some of this process, but, as the opaque and masked images of Luthi, Meatyard, and Sherman illustrate, they alone do not allow us to read its many dimensions."

This second sentence is important for me to remember in all of this.  My family narrative photographs may on the one hand be revealing for me (perhaps others too...) but they may also be frustratingly opaque.  I think I have set out to explore something about my relationship with my mother in those photographs and am certain what I have discovered is something I knew intellectually but couldn't see as have been looking through daughter's eyes.  The photographs on the one hand do indeed show me what I knew but couldn't see - and that's what makes me cry when I look at them.  But I suspect there is also much I cannot read, stuff that is hidden regardless of the camera's helpful trick of suspending moments in a frame.

I continue to read...

Other books that have been recommended are The Imaginary Signifier by Christian Metz and Questions of Visual Pleasure by Laura Malvey, both of which look at Lacan's Mirror image and seeing ideas.  I am not sure whether to tackle these before I get that Sontag one digested!  However, I am keen to read her now which I wasn't before because it is dense, verbose and challenging in the extreme.

Quotes from Family Frames as before page 118.

Exercise: Juxtaposition

I have been procrastinating about this one for a while and then realised I had one which I took recently which would be perfect.

A still life or larger scale shot.  I have gone for the latter, in which I was asked to photograph someone with a possession of the result of their hobby or work.

Now, for someone who moaned an awful lot about how they didn't like the fact they were photographing themselves and who felt horribly narcissistic for doing so,  I am doing very well as including photographs of myself in here.  However, it continues the theme, the narrative of all my course work and it's a photograph I like. Plus it has lots of juxtaposition in it.

Technically I think that I have probably got too much black in this - It's something I have noticed recently, that I do, well I noticed it before but then just carried on regardless.  I might re-edit this and compare to see. I quite like blacks and dark shadows it's true, but I think I've gone overboard sometimes and this might benefit from having a little less; not sure though until I do it.  In fact, every time I look at it, I think - oooh, it's a bit garish!  Maybe that's just my mood today.

However, on the content side, I like this because it literally and metaphorically has lots of levels to it.
I am in it as I have been in so many of my photographs for this course.  But I'm not fully in.  I am doing what I love doing - my work and hobby, photography, and finding ways to express myself.  I am in a mirror - which is an obvious metaphor for self reflection, which is what all this work has been about, but I am obscured and I'm not sure if it is immediately obvious I am taking a photograph to anyone who is isn't a photography nut.  I'm in a car park with a bunch of discarded stuff and in a way all those boards could be suggestive of all the layers in me, or the layers through which I must get through before I get seen.  If I were to think of a title for this it might be "in the picture'.  Which ties in with what we were discussing at the TV meeting the other day, where it was suggested I try to inveigle my way into the family photographs I might take for A5 all the time - always trying to be seen.  Finally, the sign at the top could be about me or about the car park, could be about life - who knows?  Is that a bit pedestrian?  Not sure.  Anyway, I liked this photograph and thought it was heading in the direction of something distinctively 'me'.

A very long post: Jamie Diamond & the Reborners and my response to it.

"What good in a desert is a drop of water?  It's not my body that thirsts, it's my heart."

Yerma in the play of that name by Frederico Garcia Lorca

The quote I have used above is from a play that is all about yearning.  For the central character it is about yearning for a child which never comes.  "Barren... barren, I know I am!" she shouts.  I have used this quote here because I came across some work which immediately struck me as profound, intriguing and incredibly interesting - and spoke to me about yearning at a very deep level. Although this post looks at that work it really explores some of the things within in it that struck a chord with me and why, and how that might inform my own future work.  

Jamie Diamond has produced two series' of photographs titled "I Promise To Be A Good Mother" and "Mother Love".  In these she uses a hyper-realistic doll as as a prop, reenacting scenes and memories from her own childhood, dressed in her own mother's clothes and playing the role of her mother in the images, as well as the future mother she may become.  This sort of doll is used usually for a variety of reasons and costs anything from $250 to $10 000.  Originally they were designed for comforting alzheimer's patients, people suffering with empty nest syndrome, or miscarriage and the loss of a child. However, there are also a community of artists called Reborners who have these dolls in their lives permanently, living with them as one would with real babies, as far as possible.  Jamie Diamond has embedded herself within this community and even set up an online shop making and selling them, and says she has learnt a great deal from these women. The doll she uses in her images is called Annabel.

Jamie Diamond is a truly interesting artist and I will write more fully about her in another post.  But for the meantime;  

I find this particular work absolutely fascinating for a variety of reasons:

I am really beginning to get to grips with the fact that photography-as-an art is about so very much more than  pretty or cleverly manipulated pictures.  The type of photograph that draws 'oohs and aahs' is one thing but certain photographic art has the potential, although sometimes subtler and quieter, to be deeply moving, powerful, and thought provoking in the same way a book, play or a film might be, with a narrative. In fact, I think that photography has an advantage over spoken art forms.  Theatre in particular can be quite frustrating - music, mis-en-scene, atmosphere can all be set up and then broken suddenly by an actor's failure to be convincing or truthful.  A series of photographs whether looked at in a gallery or on the screen at home, or in a book gives the viewer a moment to really reflect upon things within his or herself very privately, either at the time or later in a way that is ongoing.  I felt this when I looked at Larry Sultan's work at the beginning of this course and was surprised to be so very moved by his Pictures from Home.  Seeing Sharon Boothroyd's work the other night also reminded me of this, and then looking at the work by Jamie Diamond did too.

The photographs are indeed beautiful (as were Sharon's) but as I say, in a quiet and unassuming way. There is none of the flashy trickery and showing off that I am used to seeing on Flickr for instance, some of which is very impressive, it's true.  Jamie Diamond's photographs in these two series' are skilfully and expertly taken, beautifully lit with delightful clarity, not even remotely over processed, and with gorgeous depth of field that suits the dreamy quality of them.  I aspire to be able to do this. The beauty of the images also contrasts quite dramatically with the subject and content which is searingly painful, I think.  Not all her images employ the same aesthetics - some are harshly lit and very vibrant such as the one with models dressed and made up as her mother.

The subject matter is just so up my street it's not true!  Aaaah - so exciting!!  And for so many reasons: 

Years ago shortly before I had my first child I was pregnant with another and miscarried at 16 weeks. Miscarriage is fairly common; 1 in 4 pregnancies are said to end in miscarriage but even so it was devastating for me. I can absolutely see why  someone might feel the need for a hyper-realistic doll, although I have to say I have not yet got to grips with what the artistic community of Reborners are doing.   However, following my miscarriage, all I wanted was to hold my baby and seeing other people's babies intensified my sense of feeling bereft and heartbroken.  I wonder if it might have helped to have some sort of transitional baby to hold at the time, or if that would have caused more problems when the time came to let go of the pretend baby.  I can't say, of course as I did not have a pretend baby although I was overjoyed when I got pregnant again.  

Transitional toys are I think quite particular to our own society; or perhaps more fairly said, to societies where a child's emotional needs are not always met as fully as they might be as I do believe it is in childhood that the blueprint for our coping mechanisms are formed.  And we as a society certainly continue to utilise transitional objects throughout our lives, sometimes allowing those objects to become permanent. Tranquilisers, alcohol, things that we buy to try and feed some unmet need we don't always understand.  

Thumb sucking, perhaps an example of the earliest form of transitional satisfaction, is thought to be an emotional form of self-soothing that is desirable by many in our society but not by all. 

"When signals are missed, babies stop signaling; they withdraw; they suck their thumbs; they turn away; they try to right the system themselves by not sending out any more signals" (1) 

If you think about thumb sucking, and any further self-soothing transitional behaviour as a pattern that stems from unmet needs then you have to question what it is that is missing in our society and perhaps in the community of people who live with these fantasy babies (although, I must reiterate, I have not thought enough about what is going on in this artistic endeavour).

I think it is fascinating that we exist in a society where hyper-realistic dolls are manufactured in the first place; that they might be given to people who are grieving for the loss of a child; and even more extraordinary that there is a community who exist with these dolls in fantasy relationships.

But what really strikes me as profound is that a baby/mother relationship is a reciprocal symbiotic relationship; or at any rate the biological blueprint suggests that it ought to be.  The baby feeds and oxytocin flows in both parties.  If it weren't that way mothers might find it all too much to bear and babies would die, which of course does happen because our in our society there is much to thwart the whole process.  Even in cases that are not extreme, babies across the social spectrum grow up without satisfactory parenting and the cycle continues as they have their own babies and inflict the same lack of 'feeding' on future babies.

"In a more evolutionary infant-caretaker scheme, the infant is a social partner, part of a dyad*.  Both mother and infant are interested in being in equilibrium, that is in a stable and contented state.  This goal is achieved by a mutual regulation, by reciprocity, and by keeping tabs on each-other." (2)

It is therefore quite challenging to consider what the Reborners might be receiving from their hyper-realistic infants? 

However, is it really any weirder than the trend in our society to have faux-communities online rather than genuine communities in the real world for instance because that is what this makes me think about.  We in our world do all we can to negate real experience and have instead pale and less fulfilling ones.  

We also fill our days with work; pre-industrial communities tend to have a better work/life balance (3).  And with material objects rather than living relationships.  We over-value things and material matters, as well as the prizes we strive for such as cars, houses and holidays instead of the things that truly matter such as family connections for instance.  And we do it all without thinking about it, without questioning it in the main.

The Reborner community for me epitomises some part of our society; and I say this with little value judgement.  I'm as addicted to my 'pacifiers' as anyone else is, believe me.  In fact I think perhaps their project is about mirroring back to us something about our capacity for avoiding real experience.

The quote above refers to a deep and urgent need in Yerma for a child, she is desperate for a burst of fertility, for growth, to give birth.  I have included it as I think the play is a wonderful metaphor for the yearnings many of us have.  I certainly do, for a sense of fulfilment. For me the manifestation is a desire to make art, the photography and perhaps writing, the ability to create and express.  My fourth child that I yearn for is not an actual child (heaven forbid!!) but the ability to express whatever it is in me that I long to shout about.  

I am intrigued by the Reborners.  I am reminded of Pinocchio which I have just read with Alfred, my middle child, and wonder if there is something in there worth thinking about.  Pinocchio so wants to be a genuine child, to be flesh and blood.   To be real.

The other significant part of Jamie Diamond's work is the relationship with her own mother which she re-enacts as well as the very poignant future mother/child relationship she hopes to have.  The series titled 'I promise I will be a good mother' would evoke something emotional in most women I should imagine and of course for me that is no different.  I suspect most women have difficult and awkward aspects to their relationships with their mothers; but I have to say it is an extremely important part of the work that I did for A4, and in the work I do outside of that - the ongoing work of being a mother myself, understanding who I am, and the lifelong work of exploring my relationship with my own mother and how that has affected me.

Not long after I gave birth for the first time I started reading.  I read so much about the nature of motherhood; books that were difficult to understand because I had not studied anthropology or sociology but were nevertheless compelling because that bond between a mother and a baby is so strong, so primordial, and deeply ingrained that it is really, really difficult to understand how it can go wrong.  But it does; women suffer from devastating post natal-depression which in the most extreme cases can lead to infanticide; women don't bond fully with their babies; women sometimes leave their children as my own mother did because there are such barriers within them preventing them from fulfilling the role of mother  - and in all these cases, we are terrified by the reality of it and sometimes find it impossible to understand.  I know if ever I talk about my own mother leaving to friends they are shocked and find it bewildering and at times upsetting. For me the thought of leaving my children is unthinkable - so trying to understand how that could have occurred is something I have spent a lot of time with, one way or another, and it seems I continue to do so through the photographic work I do.  In fact, I am certain that the idea of photographing a family is very much to do with that.  The family I have chosen to work with is one that has a very different history to mine and exploring some aspects of that mother/daughter relationship is going to be interesting for me.  

But back to Jamie Diamond's work:

"Working with the Reborn community has allowed me to explore the grey area between reality and artifice where relationships are constructed with inanimate objects, between human and doll, artist and artwork, uncanny and real," Diamond says in her statement. "I have been engaged with this community now for four years and while working and learning from these women, I’ve become fascinated by the fiction and performance at the core of their practice and the art making that supports their fantasy."  ( 4. quote taken from the Huffington Post article below)

The community of Reborners keep their fantasy going indefinitely and it's difficult not to wonder why.  It's something that interests me deeply.  And reminds me of something I read yesterday where a photographer talked about her whole life being 'the art' - at which point the camera almost becomes an irrelevance.  (This post is so long already I shall have to go into that in more detail another time if at all - the sense of nihilism there is just a bit strong for my tastes.)

The pictures themselves are strange - they are are disturbing and almost harrowing for me at times. The one that I find most difficult is one where the 'mother' is in bed with her pretend child.  For me this space, the most intimate of spaces, is so tricky so see like this.  It takes the photographs I took of me in my bed alone for A4 a very large step further.  To think of someone lying there next to a body that is not alive, can never be alive, is only ever pretend and in effect dead is harrowing - and evocative of relationship structures in my childhood, and I imagine in Jamie Diamond's.

I was profoundly moved by these pictures for many reasons.  I think the image quality and simplicity is something to aspire towards, as is the deep involvement the photographer has with the community of Reborners.  I am fascinated by their practise - it seems surreal and peculiar but they are not really doing anything stranger than what so many others, myself included, do online - whole lives are lived on the internet rather than in reality and this is another big interest of mine.  The only difference is that online living is deemed normal because its something that has swept through our culture and been absorbed thoroughly with great speed.

And nor is it any stranger than trying to feed an unmet need with tobacco leaves on fire which is really odd when you stop to think about it, or any of the other things we do to satisfy the deep sense of yearning that people are capable of experiencing, and that Yerma feels when she longs for a child to make her life complete as explored in the quote at the top of this post.  I do hope I haven't gone on too long here about these things but I think that all I have discussed will inform the next assignment and future assignments and work because it covers so much that I am interested in.

Yerma quote from Act 2, Scene 2, Yerma by Frederico Garcia Lorca, translated by Peter Luke and first performed at The National Theatre, 19th March, 1986, Methuen.

*Dyad - a dyad as I understand it is the space in which the infant and mother exist.  When allowed the mother creates a space in which her infant can be, attached to her in its earliest months but always able to return as the infant grows into a toddler, and when in need of contact and grounding.  It is a physical and metaphysical space.

Quotes 1, 2 & 3 are from Our Babies, Ourselves; How Biology and Culture Shape the Way We Parent by Meredith F. Small, Anchor Books, 1999.

Huffington Post article

Jamie Diamond's website

Prints & other things

Just had some prints back from the printers and whilst I am used to editing and then printing family portraits, I seem to have a little to learn about printing other work. I tend to push the darks and blacks too much which works on screen mostly (or does it?) but not on prints at all.  In the past blacks have just been too dense for my liking and if I were to use the images I've just got back, which I'm not planning to now, I would need to redo them for sure as everything looks far too dirty and dull. This is something I've noticed before and must remember for the future.

The other night I went to Sharon Boothroyd's opening of her They All Say Please exhibition which I really enjoyed for several reasons (not least the very positive and encouraging feedback I received from fellow students - thank you!)  One of the most interesting things for me was to hear about how Sharon had printed herself.  As soon as I went in I was struck by how beautiful the colours were.  I have to say I have always been a bit wary of printing myself and had pushed that to the back of my mind.  I recall being quite impressed by some of the prints I saw at the last Thames Valley (TV) meeting which had been done by students themselves rather than a lab but I had dismissed that for me because I didn't really believe I could ever get to grips with it.  But having seen Sharon's prints I am wondering if I should think about printing myself at some point in the future.  Something to chat about with others tomorrow at the next TV meeting.

Finally, I was very pleased when I pointed out a particular image to Sharon that I liked very much and she replied, "Yes, that's very you", which I took to mean the photograph was somehow reminiscent of the work I have submitted.  Yay, there is a recognisable Me - which suggests I have a developing and recognisable, distinctive voice.  A friend also just had a look at some of the work I've submitted and said the images were like mini-plays which pleased me no end.

Narrative idea & progress

I think I will continue with my collection of walls which I have been building for a few weeks, or perhaps a couple of months for the narrative project.  This may seem a bit odd because what sort of story can you tell with a collection of wall images?

I am thinking I shall use an old Reader's Digest book that I remember from my childhood, and which thankfully my mother still owns, as a source of information to create a narrative about how to build walls.  I don't suppose I can quote directly from it the whole way through, but I would like to mention it as the source and obviously refer to pages etc for any direct quotes I do use.

I may want to interweave short parables (inspired by Louise Bourgeois' "He disappeared into complete silence") but I am not sure how that would work yet.  I am writing down ideas for these though as they come to me as it may be that I can find a way to do this.  I wonder if having two narratives would work: one with 'how to build walls', then turn the book over and with the same photographs have the other narrative, my parables, going the other way.   I have a while to think about it... it's an idea for now, although of course one that has been done plenty, I'm sure.


As for prisons:  I have had a very nice response from the media department saying that it is something that requires a lot of resource to organise and so would only be considered if the photographer could guarantee a lot of people seeing the work.  So I replied and I said I would get in touch again when I had built up a significant body of work.

I responded to a request to do some voluntary work with a charity so if that comes about then it might be the start of building up that work.  I know I have been taking photographs of people for a while now but I'm not sure I feel ready to take the sort of photographs I'm thinking about, which need to be sensitive, respectful and kind, and peer into something difficult that also feels dangerous.  Maybe I never will be - think that's a pretty hard thing to get right.

Feedback and my response

I was pleased to receive very positive feedback because as usual I was a bit nervous about the direction I had taken.  I have inserted my responses below in blue.

Tutor report

Student name	Sarah-Jane Field	Student number
Course/Module	AoP	Assignment number	4

Overall Comments

This is another engaged and engaging assignment that provides further evidence of how you’re committed to your studies, specifically, and to exploring photography (and beyond) more broadly. From A2 onwards there’s been a real sense of someone finding their feet in artistic terms and of being able to articulate this with their camera. It’s also reassuring to see how you’re not losing sight of the technical issues that underpin your efforts, and the accompanying text that critically reflected on the outcome of some of the assignment’s photographs gave a very clear indication of you determination to improve and move forward.

Re the specifics of the brief and what was required, this is always something that is going to be open to interpretation- such is the nature of art and the expectations of higher education- but if there’s any suggestion that you’ve veered off course, your accompanying notes provide an eloquent counter, and are expressed with a level of conviction that mirrors the approach to the photographs you are taking.

In spite of your concerns over how appropriately your response to the brief has been, I still maintain that you absolutely should submit for assessment. Each assignment has been underpinned by a sense of inquisitiveness and a willingness to take chances and experiment. While this is a virtue in its own right, it’s by no means the only one: experimenting is one thing, but experimenting with purpose and achieving consistently interesting and worthwhile results- which you are doing- is another. Certainly from A2 onwards, while there’s not been- as I’m sure you’d be the first to admit!- a ‘flawless’ submission, this is perhaps less important than the fact that you’re taking chances and avoiding any internal policing that might whisper that it would be better to play it safe. So in this sense your approach to the course is most encouraging, and if you carry on in this way it seems almost certain that your work will continue to improve.

Technically, I think I will always have holes and flaws, but the more I work at it creatively, as you say, the better that will become just through doing it and making the mistakes that I make.  

Assessment potential

I understand your aim is to go for the Photography/Creative Arts Degree and that you plan to submit your work for assessment at the end of this course. From the work you have shown in this assignment, providing you commit yourself to the course, I believe you have the potential to succeed at assessment.  In order to meet all the assessment criteria, there are certain areas you will need to focus on, which I will outline in my feedback.   

Feedback on assignment

Demonstration of technical and Visual Skills, Quality of Outcome, Demonstration of Creativity

I really like the way your accompanying text discusses the stylistic shift for this assignment. After A2 and A3, which had obvious stylistic parallels, I did wonder how you’d approach A4, and whether you’d look to develop your interest in blurred, slightly elusive imagery. The emotional resonance of the images here is similar to A2 and A3, but stylistically there’s a world of difference, and whatever it is that you’ve been ‘reaching for’ is being expressed in a more muted and ‘controlled’ fashion than the previous two assignments. The blurred images express a certain chaos, whereas the images here aim for something much more precise. I can’t help but think that this shift in style represents a shift in something else- the blurred images by definition obscure you, but here everything is that bit more ‘direct’. But, nevertheless, a shift in style hasn’t meant a complete shift in mood and tone. These images are still very clearly ‘yours’.

I have certainly not abandoned blurry images for good but for now I think I am looking for clarity and definition.  

I notice on a follow-up thread on your blog you’ve been very critical of the amount of ‘horrible’ noise in these images. This might be overstating things a bit, but in any case, I don’t think that this has an overly detrimental effect on the series as a whole. Nevertheless, it’s obviously a good thing that you’re scrutinising your work to the nth degree, and should keep on doing this (but with a sense of proportion!). If you continue to apply yourself in the manner that you clearly have been on AoP, such technical niggles will eventually be ironed out as your methodologies become more established and your sense of what works/ doesn’t work is further honed. 

Last night I spent some time looking through the images I have taken over the last two years and I have to say the chaos in my head is evident in many of the choices (or rather the inability to make choices) about exposure and composition.  I saw how much I have learnt by comparing what I was doing 18 months ago to what I would do now without thinking about it.  So although I can be hard on myself I do appreciate how far I've come.  I do get frustrated with myself though.

So, for me, it’s the expressive/ ‘artistic’ side of things, and your creative response to what is quite a deceptively tricky brief, that most stands out here. Nevertheless, it was very interesting that you were thinking about leaving this image out…

I can appreciate your misgivings, but in terms of a) how it responds to a particular part of the brief and b) its initial impact as part of a wider series, it’s a striking, arresting image that uses light and colour to evoke a lovely mood- one that provides a nice counter to the almost abrasive impact of some of photographs in A3. It was an inventive way to respond to the brief, and one that, for me, transcends the technical problems you’ve identified in your notes.

Good, I'm glad to read that.  I was just annoyed by my clumsiness with placing the reflector in-shot which meant I had to crop so much.  I still make these mistakes and need to stop doing it really.  I really like the mood of the image as well as the light and colour and am glad I kept it in.

If there’s one image in this assignment that stands in total stylistic contrast to the work done in A2 and A3 it’s perhaps this one:

It’s not a ‘showy’ image, is pleasingly pared-down in a compositional sense, and uses light in a simple and unobtrusive manner, demonstrating that there’s a growing range to your palette.

I am very pleased this image has been picked up on - I am beginning to like less 'showy' images quite a lot.

Overall, in spite of any reservations about stretching the limits of the brief, light clearly leaps out here as being central to the construction of these photographs. It’s also a series of photographs that works really well as a set, and has managed to respond very creatively to a brief that can be quite restrictive in some ways. I’ll leave it for you to decide if you think some reshoots are necessary so as to lessen your feeling of ‘horrible’ noise, but one thing that might be worth revising is the captions that accompany each photograph- if you stress which part of the brief each is a specific response to, it’ll tighten everything up in relation to the assignment outline and serve to work alongside your accompanying text that explains your decision to position yourself as the series’ ‘object’.

I am very happy to put some captions in that highlight which part of the brief each image responds to.

Learning Logs or Blogs/Critical essays

Context

This side of your work on the course represents an impressive accompaniment to the photographs you’re producing, and is consistently thoughtful, engaging, and demonstrates someone who’s making a good deal of progress. Even just a cursory glance at your blog points to the fact that words are as important as images in all this, and text-based posts are certainly not marginal, reluctant, tokenistic entities, and are eloquent and engaging in their own right, giving a clear sense of how you’re progressing through the course.

Words are very important to me especially as someone who comes (albeit quite a long time ago now) from a background in text based theatre.  I am very keen to keep developing the writing side of what I'm doing here, both artistically and academically.  I think I probably could do with more concentrated effort in the latter, although only when I have more head space in the future, i.e as my youngest grows.

Suggested reading/viewing

Context

With the final assignment looming, this is something we should discuss on Skype (particularly as the piece of work you were looking to undertake might be logistically unfeasible now).

(But having seen you mention on your blog being bowled over by Frank’s The Americans, take a look at Mishka Henner’s gloriously nihilistic Less Americains).

Pointers for the next assignment

Again, this is something we can discuss on Skype. But as a general- and rather insipid!- pointer, just keep going. You’ve certainly ‘taken control’ of your studies here, and throughout Art of Photography have used the assignments as a way to explore your growing photographic, thematic and personal interests, and to develop your technical skills. Perhaps as a general principle, it might be an idea to move away from self-portraiture for this last one: it’s something that’s accounted for three assignments now, assignments which have demonstrated a range of growing technical skills and an evolving artistic voice.   

I am certainly planning to move away from self portraiture - it took a little leap of something internally but I have documented that 'struggle' in one of the exercises for the next section of TAOP.  I may use something I have already been doing where I have found a narrative emerging - I will need to speak with you about this in our Skype call though as I have some questions.

An assignment that rounds the course off with some work that foregrounds something a little different might be worth considering- but this is up to you, of course. I get the feeling that, such are the steps that you’ve taken, even taking an approach where the subject matter is beyond what you’ve produced for the course so far, that the work would still be identifiably ‘yours’.

Tutor name	Andrew Conroy
Date	11/3/15
Next assignment due	11/6/15