LINK TO PHOTOBOOK – ‘A STATE OF CONTENTMENT’

Below is the final layout of my book which i have produced as a part of my personal investigation. Included in my photo book is the essay for my personal study. I have decided to produce a standard portrait book as most of the images in my series are portraits so thy fill the page. I didn’t go for the bigger portrait book as i felt the images would have been too big and the audience wouldn’t of been able to take in the images as well. i had left the front cover till i had finished the rest of the layout to the book because i wasn’t sure what story i wanted to present on the outside of the book. I knew that i didn’t want the front cover to be revealing but i also wanted to to tell a broad story of what my photo book was about. i decided to go with the image below covering both the back and the front as it was taken in the morning whilst travelling to the building site and local community. the hue and inability to see faces in this images leaves a sense of mystery which i liked as its leaving the audience to imagine what the book is going to be about although through connotations of the road, it is as if the reader is about to be taken on a journey. The image wraps round both the front and back cover because it shows that the journey ended the same way it began. the front cover shows going into the community and then throughout the book it looks closer into individuals and then towards the end it begins to show moving away from the community as i am finishing the aid project and then the back cover being the road again symbolic of  how i left the situation, and that i was only an outsider in their community.

I decided the title of my book ‘ A State of Contentment’ when i was actually in Burkina Faso completely submerged in the situation that i was in. The idea came to me when we were on the building site discussing the local community and thinking of all the things we are grateful for that we were getting to go home to. It was evident to us that we would only be in Africa living a minimalist life for a few weeks whereas the reality for the local community was that they would be experiencing this hardship for the most of their lives. Although this seems like a harsh thought we had all noticed that even though the community had so little they were utterly content with what they had and i said during this discussion that it seemed as though they were in a state of contentment, because the community truly were in a state of peaceful happiness. I put the title and my name on the cover so that the writing did not take away from the cover image.

I then decided to put on the first page the title as it would be the first thing you see when opening the book. This then allows the audience to consider further what the book was going to contain. it also leads you into the book. The initial image that you come to in my photo book is a full bleed double page spread as it has the impact of drawing you into the book and the environment. The photograph shows the children helping on the building site which gives initial information to what the narrative is. Together with the girl standing in the image then links into the next image as the photo book then focuses on individuals. All of the images where kept in colour because i believe this created a more realistic representation of the situation whereas when the images were turned to black and white it over dramatized the images creating unrealistic representations which made it look like an unhappy situation.

 Following the initial images which set the scene of why i was there and what was going on, i then moved into individual narratives for a few images before finding an image which then linked to the next scene. My book is constructed in a way as if it tells all the different aspects of the community. For example he pages above and below show education and occupation as well as the sequence of the colours flows. These small selections of images show the diversity of lifestyles that these children have, for example, some of the portraits show children who are lucky enough to have the access the education but then the complete opposite is shown where a young boy is carrying is little brother as he doesn’t have the opportunity to go to school because he has the full time job of caring for his little brother.

As the book continues the double spread image of the cows is symbolic of moving onto another area. the next image still continuing to focus on portraits of individuals now focuses on a women outside of town and how she has her own business of selling cloth in the local market to gather money. The next  following image shows another family also who have their own business but this time selling grain around the local village.

The idea of linking the portraits with an ‘object image’ was that it told more in detail about that certain individual in terms of their job or general life, normally what i managed to find out about that individual through asking general questions either in french if they were adults or more educated or the native language of the village.

I was aware that my book was following the same sequence and including a lot of the same style of images, i therefore decided to take a slightly different approach on this specific image. As throughout the book i focus on specif individuals and provide a bit of insight into their lives i decided to go slightly deeper and focus on one individual which Andrew ‘the trip leader’ has had a connection with him for the last 6 years and has visited him on most of the annual trips to Burkina Faso. He allowed us too look around his home, told us about his job situation and family and then showed us some of his own persona;l archives. As Archival imagery has been a theme throughout our coursework project i decided it would be beneficial to add into the book giving even more background on life in Burkina Faso.

To close my book i considered how a day ended whilst we were over there. The last few images in my photo book show the closing activities for the community. Collecting water was allowed at allocated times when the water supply was turned on to allow for fair distribution of water, this was a job which mostly women did and would occur at around 5. The following image shows the market women after a day of work. The bike then shows the sun beginning to set as the light becomes more orange and a lot more shadows are evident in the image. Finally the closing image, the sunset over the building site. This is symbolic of the closing of a day and also the book and the journey that i embarked on. i think that this brings the photo book to a gentle close.

Also included in my photo book is my personal study. I decided to include my essay into the book at it links to the images i took. The focus of my essay was subjectivity and how it can effect the authenticity of representations of third world countries. Throughout the essay i consider different arguments and end with analyzing some of my works in the photo book and whether my images are raw representations or if i have allowed subjectivity to effect the authenticity of the local African community.

Overall, i have produced photo book which conveys community in a third world country in an authentic manner. The book is what i wanted to produce and reflects the project and the experience that i was able to be involved in, highlighting how each individual is what makes a community. The images which i made which are included in my photo book are ones which i am proud of and think were constructed thoughtfully showing my technical skill as a photographer as well as my ability to put together a photo book which conveys a narrative. I have thoroughly enjoyed this project, both capturing images which i have never had the opportunity to before as well as creating a photo book which was also very new to me at the beginning of the project