Whilst Tom Pope was here, he enlightened us about his personal influences. He stated that he was guided by the situationism movement and used it in his photography. He allows himself to be lead by his surroundings and let that guide him.

Definition:

This psycological theory suggests that our behavioral changes depend on the situation  that we’re in. Therefore, it implies that the environment may have control over our feelings and emotions. It isn’t concerned with personal opinions, personalities and ideologies. It also disregards any sort of innate thoughts.

For example, if you visit a park, you may be drawn to the aesthetically beautiful qualities in it. This is because, as a photographer, you may have trained yourself to only photograph the best things. Whereas, situationism allows you to expand this view and help you to try and explore something less ordinary. Likewise if you are in an unknown scenario and you feel uncomfortable, your behavior may be impacted.

Experiment:

The Stanford Prison Experiment was conducted, to test the theory of Situationism. In this study, everyday people where selected to participate in hopes of proving the theory. They were instructed to act like ‘guards’. The remaining participants were assigned the ‘prisoners’ role. It was noted that the ‘guards’ began to adopt a stereotypical behavior. They were acting in a more aggressive and disciplinary fashion towards the ‘prisoners’. This shows that they may have based their mood on their roles and the fact that their in a prison building. Therefore, this experiment supports Situationism, as it indicates that people change their demeanor, depending on the situation.

Birth of the Concept:

This concept started in the late 1950’s and kept going until the early 1970’s and was influenced by Surrealism, Dadaism  and also Lettrism. in 1957,’Situationiste Internationale’, a very famous magazine was founded, which included various artistic things inside it. This movement began with many traditional artists. However, as time went on, the group started to include look at different ways of creating art, by looking at the theme of Anarchy.

Situationism included two main concepts. The first was ‘The Spectaceand it’s society’ and the second ‘Détournement’. The Spectacle is used a lot in Situationism; It looks at how society is ruled by certain commands by people with more power than them. Whereas, Détournement signifies hijacking. it’s all about changing expressions against themselves. This influentual movement was used for political pranks.

My Views:

Personally, I think that Situationism is a very interesting subject. It’s something new and exciting to challenge. The fact that you must hold back on your personal feelings and almost become aligned with external features. I think that this allows humans to explore the world from a different perspective.

Situationist International