#furtherresearch

As influence: see what the models are wearing off duty - in Paris.

Main influence: see what the models are wearing off duty - in London.

Jess Maybury

Jill Kortleve

These images are a visual representation of the aesthetic for Maya’s series to be exhibited as part of the London Culture Exhibition. This series is shot by Melodie Jeng between west to central to east London capturing models daily between LFW shows.

The portraits she takes give a subtle idea of candidness, but they are mostly posed street photographs. The frame, perspective or crop she has used for each individual seems unique. As she doesn’t follow a repetitive technique, her portraits give an idea of character and personification to the models. Her concept for the series is clearly outlined to the audience, in the title and the photographs create a relationship between fashion and the sitter. Throughout the series you begin to see re-occurring fashion statements/ styles, which for every viewer could mean a different thing: for me I noticed a casual/ comfy aesthetic that started to pop up multiple times through out the series, which began to show me something about the models that are highly glamed up for the catwalk - everyone likes to be comfortable. I began to reflect on my own fashion sense and how comfortable I wanted to be in my own clothes and I started to see a true or deeper representation of the person behind the ‘model’.

Pilot Project Title: “Rebel Girls”

Name: Patrycja Borecka

Research Methods:

  As an activist I wanted to make a project related to current affairs. I basically started absorbing all related information which I came across or found through my research:  -photography - going to exhibitions, reading recently published books and magazines, doing my own practice, try to understand medium more

-sociological - listening to the radio programs and podcasting, talking to people, internet research about struggles which people have it nowadays,

-Political - following the news, try to understand the relation between the countries,

-technological - learning about new radical technologies and how they can be used and what impact they have on human beings and planet.

All four bullet points above are connected together.

  As an active photography practitioner I often go on the streets to document protests in London. As this was not enough, I challenge myself to interview demonstrators, record them, write narrative to the event and ask for a portrait in fast paced location. At the beginning I found conducting interviews quiet uncomfortable, but with time I realised that it makes me closer to demonstration in terms of understanding other people’s views and ways of thinking about political issues. This experience taught me new interpersonal skills. I went to see unauthorised exhibition, “Temporary Autonomous Art” in Lewisham, the event took place in an abandoned building which currently is occupied by squatters, the local authorities are aware of occupation but do not really bother to take any actions as developers did not spot yet the opportunity to build more “affordable” flats.   The exhibition was enormous ( three floors in large warehouse, over sixty artists) and I did not see all things. However the work of artists was pretty much underground, against the system and capitalism. It did represented the oppressions, global issues and beauty of socialising with other humans. I have an opportunity to talk to artists and hear their stories. The exhibition highlighted the need of creating the art not the need of making a profit through the art.

  Another exhibition was in Foyless (bookshop in central London). It was one floor display next to the fancy coffee place and it was connected to a new “historical” book publication, Peter Kennard: Visual Dissent. Peter Kennard is an unofficial war artist, I came across his name while I was following news about Arms Fair 2019 in London. I found his work very close to my own values, on Instagram I saw the new book release and I went to see the exhibition. His photo collages and forty years of art work did pay back in changes of political regulations. He is a big inspiration to me. The Visual Dissent book taught me more about rising up and strikes in the past, it made me visit the National Gallery and painting which inspired Kennard to make art. I also attended a talk with Peter and went to visit him in his studio. We spoke about politics, China, art, money and Augmented Reality. He introduced me to the name Hito Steyerl, who was having an exhibition at Serpentine Sackler Gallery in Hyde Park. It was augmented reality exhibition called Actual Reality.

  Steyerl’s work maybe visually was not as impressive as Kennard’s photomontages but the subject which she chose to interrogate was very interesting: inequality, workers rights, wealth and housing crisis. This made me think that however I will try to display my work it is not that important as the content of my work, however without any specific chosen content ( I knew it will be about politics, human rights or global warming) I decided go for Augmented Reality form as my presentation form. This decision has been made due to theoretical reading about digital photography and its form, the list of books will be shown in section Visual References and Bibliography.

  Being open minded, reading about theory, look for inspiration within artists with the same interest, trying to be aware what is happening around the world, listening to the radio programs Digital Human, Digital Planet, Woman’s Hour, following the news online, talking to people and listening to their stories. The constant thoughts about project and trials to make connections within many rising global issues made me decide to use unmaterial form AR to represent women as activists.

 My Pilot Project it will be a short video of images found on the internet. The visual content will represent women’s rise up, women as fighters who can stand up against oppression. The revolutionary women who can safe the planet before human extinction. The video will be shown in Augmented Reality and my aim is to add the music related to the subject - Bikini Kill, Rebellion Girl. Ideally I would like to create and put it into the AR based on geolocation, not on QR code, because of the location where I would like to AR-image/video to be triggered, and that will be The National Gallery building. In this gallery there is over a couple of thousand paintings but only less than one percent is being done by women. Chosen image to trigger augmented reality video will be one of the paintings done by Artemisia Gentileschi who was raped at the age of 17. The location seems unachievable to me, but the trick is that my video will be in augmented reality not actually in physical form, it will be displayed on the screen.

  Through this project I achieved bigger understanding of the role of women in society. The journey gave me a picture of male driven world in old structures while humanity has changed so much through the invention of smartphones and advanced technology. I do understand that now we are screen based overgrown population and planet cannot afford have nearly nine billion of us, certainly there is going to be a food problem. The greed of rich is scary, the world is de-fusied as genres of photography. Following Joanna Zylinska’s theory I have an image of photography as a parallel of life. The wider knowledge about current position of photography and social behaviour of humans is making me depressed and hopeless for a better future. Probably it is already too late to defend democracy and human rights. 

Pilot Project:

  From the first ideal thought of being a photojournalist I end up being a programmer and picture researcher. The methods I used in bullet points: - Simply taking photos - improving technical skills - Portraiture and interviewing people - new interpersonal skills -Creating political photo collages, analog form cut & glue it - learning new technique and use my imagination and creativity making /creating Augmented Reality - learning new technical skills, useful for further employment or projects -Research specific images in World Wide Web - learning about research, sequencing and meanings of visual content

  From my Pilot Project and the hope about women to save humanity and freedom I came to the conclusion  that humans are a threat to themselves and to the planet I would like to communicate this with a wider audience. Few samples:   -Taking selfies and family photos on public domains - IBM company took advantage and collected a large number of  family photos to train algorithms to create facial recognition software (https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2019/03/12/ibm-criticised-collecting-social-media-photos-facial-recognition/), then the company sales the program to China, to the country which is ranked as one of the worst countries for Freedom of Speech according by Reporters Without Borders (https://rsf.org/en/ranking#). The country where people are disappearing, they are oppressed and killed for their opinions or beliefs. - Zylinska is talking that we are overpopulated, this is a threat to the planet and causes climate change - human actions, -Radical technologies - production of smartphone - child labour in China, exploitation of raw materials in Africa also child labour. All this because we need to purchase a new model of smartphone which makes us less smart than ever. According to the World Economic Forum in The Global Risks Report 2020 two thirds of the population owns the smartphone! (http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_Global_Risk_Report_2020.pdf). The current economic, environmental and political issues are making women (in majority) depressed and anxious, following with decisions to stop having babies for instance. My main concept for Major Project will be to try to make people aware that even though we are living in countries where life standards are on good level we still can cause damage globally. We can be harmful towards other people (child labour because of demand to produce smartphones for example) and to the planet, climate change is caused by human actions.   

Audience and Context:

  While making my pilot  project I focused more on context than on audience. However my context of representing women as a strong human being will probably lead to the bigger female audience than male one. As a mature women with experience of abuse, depression and discrimination I can imagine how many silent girls who are struggling to belief in themselves is there. I hope my short video will make them stronger and thicker.

Targeted Audience:

  For Pilot Project I would like to focus on female audience. Many young women are having mental problems such as depression and anxiety this follows low self esteem and lack of confidence. I want to show them that women are strong and are very valuable. I want to cheer them up  and make them belief that they can change whatever they want. There are no limits. For the male audience I want to show the image of women who can stand up for herself and for the human rights against oppression and regime.

  For my Major Project I would like to focus on people who care about ethics, human rights, climate change and are not aware that even some of  their actions cause the problem: use of smartphones, online streaming, supporting big companies etc.  

Production and Presentation

Production methods:

-Digital images -Photo-collage -Augmented Reality with video

As much as I knew what my subject will be as much I did not know what kind of visual form I will represent my work. The topics which I am interested are human rights, freedom, socio-political changes, global warming and economy. First I thought I will use my own personal photo-archives of demonstrations in London. Last year I attended many protests, such as: -Women Strikes ( still ongoing issue of inequality and gender pay  gap), - Extinction Rebellion and Youth Climate Strikes (global warming issue, threat to planet and humans - extinction), - political demonstrations - Rise Up 4 Rojava, Anti-Trump, Not My Prime Minister, Defend Democracy, Stand Up with Hong Kong - ( use of power against citizens, abuse of human rights).

However with the further reading and observations I came to the conclusion that just images from demonstrations from one location might not be enough to express my worries against all these issues. There are millions of images like this already in circulation and I have met many students (on protests) doing the same idea. With the open mind I looked into different visual forms which could include photography. The idea of making photo collages was born. I did research into a type of photo montages, history and techniques. I thought that political photo montage could be the thing. I played and made some photo collages of my images from demonstrations. After a group tutorial I got feedback about them. The feedback was constructive and made me think more about what actually I want to represent and in what form and who I want to engage with my work.

After a small emotional breakdown ( depressed that the world is broken and we are about to extinct) and further reading I came across the term Augmented Reality. I decided to have a go and familiarised myself with this new technology. I created two visual projects through Augmented Reality and I did forget to take images of it (my tutors have seen them on personal and group tutorial). On the last group tutorial I received a positive feedback about the idea how to represent the visual work and I had a discussion with tutors what content should be. The augmented reality is pretty much more flexible and it can contain nearly every form of media - audio, visual, sculpture, 3D etc etc. One tutor suggested that I could play the role of picture researcher and create a short video which then could be fit in into Augmented Reality. I did like the idea. The concept of showing work as an augmented reality - unmaterial video triggered by old painting, video displayed on the screen of a smartphone or tablet reflects on invisibility of women's problems. Like digital information, we do not see it but we experiencing it, it is there and it has a huge impact on our lives. The screen also plays the role, as we became screen-based society.

Visual References:

All selected visual references are more discussed on my Tumblr: https://gambinijournal.tumblr.com/

- Temporary Autonomous Art Exhibition - many current problems has been questioned, also a large variety of mediums used in this exhibition gave me a lot of ideas; - Visual Dissent - photo book created by Peter Kennard, taught me about history and demonstrations from past; - Guerrilla Girls - feminist activists group of artists who inspired me to continue my work with no desire to go mainstream; - M is for Menopause - exhibition at my local GP done by Abigail Hammond, Abigail told me that in the last century many women have been put into mental institutions because of their menopause. They were mentally unstable because of the hormones not because they have gone crazy. - John Heartfield political photo collages - visual inspiration - John Stezaker - variety of photo collages - visual inspiration - Hannah Hoch - photo collages and her representation of a New Women - Adbuster - Design Anarchy - Kalle Lasn-  photo book - variety of illustrations, collages, images about the same interests as mine - variety of Instagram collage artists: @Mr_cutandstick, @brooklyncollagecollective, @thecollageempire, @alexdegorska_collageart, @stellarcollages, @zellartcollage; The instagram accounts gave me the idea of what can be constructed from destruction; - Actual Reality - Hito Steyerl - exhibition at Serpentine Sackler Gallery, there are not many exhibitions with augmented reality so I was glad to go to this one and see how the AR has been used - http://photomediationsopenbook.net - Photomeditations: An Open Book is an online book created as an experiment to celebrate the book as a living object; editors Joanna Zylinska, Kamila Kuc, Jonathan Show, Ross Varney, Michael Wamposzyc, Garry Hall; - MoMAR - unauthorised gallery concept aimed at democratizing physical exhibition spaces. This concept gave the idea to exhibit my work in well known gallery through augmented reality. The new technology is giving this opportunity. - Alan Michelson and his multi-sensorial installation in augmented reality about the resilience of indigenous people. - https://www.alanmichelson.com - https://forensic-architecture.org

Bibliography:

-Zylinska, J. (2017). Nonhuman Photography. Cambridge: The MIT Press; Zylinska in her book writes about how Photography could be compared to Life and that we were always digital. She made me realise that my thoughts are not mad and there is a close connection between Photography and Extinction. -Greenfield, A. (2017). Radical Technologies: The Design of Everyday Life. London: Verso. Greenfield in his book talks about smartphones and augmented reality from mostly technical point of view. -Ghodsee, K.R. (2018). Why Women Have Better Sex Under Socialism. And Other Arguments for Economic Independence. London: The Bodley Head as a part of Penguin Random House U.K. Ghodsee made me aware of how women have been shifted through the economy to suit needs requested by governments. -Hershberger, A.E., editor, (2014). Photographic Theory: A Historical Anthology. Oxford: Wiley Blackwell. I read selected chapters in this book to understand more about the theory of Photography before digital age and shortly after the invention of jpgs. -Kennard, P. (2019). Peter Kennard: Visual Dissent. London: Pluto Press Kennard’s work allowed me to know more untold stories about politics in the past, he also became my motivation to create more photo-collages. -Cruz, E.G. and Lehmuskallio, A., editors, (2016). Digital Photography and Everyday Life: Empirical Studies on Material Visual Practices. London and New York: Routledge. This book, especially chapter “Photo-genic assemblages: photography as a connective interface” made me think about photography from a completely different perspective. Photography is no longer a medium to remember the past but it is an interface to visually communicate by humans and by machines. We use cameras with no aim to take photographs anymore. -Noble, S.U. (2018). Algorithms of Oppression: How Search Engines Reinforce Racism. New York: New York University Press. This book made me realise that human rights and democracy are under threat and consistent surveillance. The real danger to netizen are rich people in power who are able to harvest human data create algorithms, Artificial Intelligence and manipulate democratic elections which follows the political situation unstable.

Links:

-The Digital Human - https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01n7094 -Digital Planet - https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p002w6r2 -Woman’s Hour - https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b007qlvb/episodes/downloads -https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/international-womens-day-2019 -https://hyperallergic.com/530443/highlighting-the-resilience-of-indigenous-people-through-augmented-reality/ -RadioFreeEurope - https://www.rferl.org -Freedom News - https://freedomnews.org.uk -https://www.unwomen.org/en -https://www.globalfundforwomen.org/top-ten-moments-womens-rights-2018/ -http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_Global_Risk_Report_2020.pdf -https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_global_issues

Music Research - bands and artists:

- Hole

- Bikini Kill

- 7 Year Bitch

- L7

- Jack of Jill

- M.I.A.

- Sleater-Kinney

- Kate Tempest

- White Lung

- X-rey Spex

- Screaming Females

- Hands Off Gretel

- Bratmobile

- Lunachicks

greta thungberg, no one is too small to make a difference

in an attempt to understand the environmental theory, i purchased the book by greta thunberg named ‘no one is too small to make a difference’. It is an inspirational and shiveringly eyeopening book full of her speeches she has given throughout her time protesting for the climate. The speeches are well informed and full of scientifically proven facts, even when asked whether she should become a climate scientist instead, she states that “we already have all the facts and solutions. All we have to do is wake up and change” It is hugely empowering to see how one small girl can have such a huge impact nationwide, showing exactly what can be achieved if we all come together and act now. So little is being done as “no one talks about it. there are no headlines, no emergency meetings, no breaking news. No one is acting as if we were in a crisis”. Some emotionally fuelled, researched and inspirational quotes from the book, to help gain an insight into environmental theory:

“We are about to sacrifice our civilisation for the opportunity of a very small number of people to continue to make enormous amounts of money”

“If solutions within this system are impossible to find then maybe we should change the system itself?”

“The real power belongs to the people”

“Air pollution is hiding a warming, so when we stop burning fossil fuels, we already have an extra 0.5-1.1 degrees guaranteed”

“According to the IPCC, we are less than twelve years away from not being able to undo our mistakes”

“Solving the climate crisis is the greatest and most complex challenge that homo sapiens have ever faced... either we avoid setting off that irreversible chain reaction beyond human control - or we don’t”

“I don’t want your hope. I don’t want you to be hopeful. I want you to panic. I want you to feel the fear I feel every day. And then I want you to act. I want you to act as you would in a crisis. I want you to act as if your house is on fire. Because it is.”

“All that will remain of our political leaders’ legacy will be the greatest failure of human history”

“According to the IPCC report we are about eleven years away from being in a position where we set off an irreversible chain reaction beyond human control”

“If the EU is to make its fair contribution to staying within the carbon budget for the 2 degree limit, then it means a minimum of 80 percent reduction by 2030... so, it is around twice as ambitious as the current proposal”

Essay Notes:

For my essay I have considered using  deontology as the main theory of ethics and focus on Immanuel Kant’s philosophy of ethics. 

    Deontology – you have to do your duty (deon derived from Greek language- duty). You have to do what is right in the first place, because it’s the right thing to do regardless. 

Then discuss three images in relation to the theme of ethics using philosophy as method to analyse the images. One image I want to discuss in this essay is Starving Child and Vulture Kevin Carter, 1993.

...tutorial to help understanding and relation. 

Layout: (approximately)

Intro - 250 

Theory of Ethics/ Kant - 650 

Photographic Case Studies - 500 words each 

Summary - 300 

Conclusion - 300

edward burtynsky

i came across his work in the same ‘changing circumstances’ book. it has been such an inspirational book in informing my essay and work, showing me the potential of photography when it comes to environmental matters. This artist isn’t only a photographer but also a film maker, with all his work extending from environmental issues and the anthropocene. Similarly to Gina Glover, he also produced a project named ‘anthropocene’. Other project titles include oil, mines, water, quarries etc. showing a strong link between human actions and the environmental landscape within his work. One of the most interesting aspects of this project, aside from his creative, aesthetically pleasing images, was the artist’s statement. “Our planet has borne witness to five great extinction events, and these have been prompted by a variety of causes: a colossal meteor impact, massive volcanic eruptions, and oceanic cyanobacteria activity that generated a deadly toxicity in the atmosphere. These were the naturally occurring phenomena governing life’s ebb and flow. Now it is becoming clear that humankind, with its population explosion, industry, and technology, has in a very short period of time also become an agent of immense global change. Arguably, we are on the cusp of becoming (if we are not already) the perpetrators of a sixth major extinction event” 

gina glover

i came across her work in the changing circumstances: looking at the future of the planet book, it stood out to me with it’s stunning aesthetics and hidden messages. i am particularly into documentary photography, so the way in which she has chosen to document the changing landscapes, and the overbearing amounts of man-made infrastructure is inspirational

i researched her work further, and found that all of her projects revolve around the planet and its current state. This project in particular, ‘my anthropocene’ communicated her view of the rapidly changing landscapes and her shift in everyday fears. Glover speaks of being brought up during the cold war, with the atomic bomb being the leading cause of her fears, in comparison to her present day fears of the natural world. “the risks to our planet cause me to shift my concerns to the living environment, prompting me, through my photography not only to document the scientifically assessed factors of risk but also to argue for a more caring and intelligent stewardship of the natural world” This is an interesting aspect embedded in her work, as she has experienced the industrial age and the growth of the economy, leading to the deterioration of our natural resources and our stable ecosystems, firsthand. She has grown up with the boom of technology, and witnessed the ever changing landscapes of the developed world. Glover has therefore felt the need and responsibility as a human, to record this change and investigate the anthropocene. “The word was coined in 2000 by atmospheric scientists to indicate the overwhelming changes brought about by humans over the last 200 years and especially in the last 70 years”. Here she has documented places of metabolic stress, areas in which the release of pollution and co2 are heavy, where natural resources are drastically depleting, and therefore where species are suffering most dramatically from our actions and the lack of their natural habitats

looking at the future of the planet

i retrieved this book from the library, not only to help with my advanced research methods essay, but additionally the seminar. it is an inspirational book that holds a vast amount of work by different photographers and artists, to make a difference to our deteriorating planet. After each project, there is a set of words by the artists that go into depth about what they specifically have noticed about climate change, what has brought them to this point of raising awareness, and additionally even the ethics of their work. It is a large documentation of our decaying planet, the beauty of it, and the species that are going down with it 

‘a web of life’ by wendy watriss