What do you want to explore?
In my simple and Complex project, I want to explore the concept of memory and childhood identity through a sense of place, photographing important locations around the island to me. I’m exploring this through landscapes, both traditional landscapes and more abstract images. Through both these methods, I plan to capture the way that memories can change or become less clear as we get older, changing our perception of something. With my more abstract images, I plan to capture strong lines and shapes, providing a more detailed, but equally hidden view of the landscape I’m capturing. I covered the subject of identity both the Identity project and in my Islandness project this year, and this topic is something I really enjoy covering, as it means I can convey my own opinions about a very personal subject without being in front of the camera, through photographs. However, I have always stuck to portraiture, and decided in my final project that taking myself out of my comfort zone was important. – I feel much less confident taking landscapes, and in this project I wanted to explore a subject I’ve covered but in a completely different way – more subtly, with less obvious links and with more abstract images as I mentioned above.
https://www.ideelart.com/magazine/abstract-photography-tate – an article on the history of Abstract Photograhy – my chosen genre for this project.
Why it matters to you?
This project matters to me as I care a lot about where I grew up and my childhood places, and they are a big part of how I developed into the person I am now. I had quite a unique upbringing, constantly on the beach and around the sea, but also living in a lot of different places in my life. I’ve lived in many different houses in Jersey and also have links to quite a few different places on the island. Finding it difficult moving from place to place was difficult as a child, and this is something I wanted to document through my images of these important places.
How do you wish to develop your project?
I’m planning to create traditional landscape images, of places related to my childhood, such as my old houses and surrounding areas, and areas of the beach that are key places to me. Furthermore, I plan to diversify my work by creating abstract images of these areas, capturing more complex landscapes with strong shapes and textures. I am including these as I haven’t really explored abstraction in my coursework or personal study, and exploring this in my final project will allow me to explore a completely new area of study. As my final outcome, I plan to produce a photobook, after producing one for my personal study at the end of my coursework. This was something I really enjoyed, and creating another photobook for my exam project with a completely different type of my photobook, with completely different material and layout.
In my photobook for my personal study, I found the layout to be a little too chaotic for my liking and therefore this time when creating one I will keep it very simple, with fewer pages – I felt also in my personal study photobook that I had too many pages, with too many images included. This made it difficult for me to work with, and I found that I had trouble creating a narrative. It was difficult to make sure so many pages flowed succinctly together, and I think that creating a smaller, simpler book for this project will produce an outcome that has a strong story to it, that flows from beginning to end. I plan to create a different kind of photobook from what I made in my personal study. In my personal study, I used a hardback image wrap cover, and found that inside portraits were slightly tarnished by the folding of the book in the middle of the page – this is not something I want to have the problem with within my final photobook, hence my decision to use a different type of book.
I have also thought about creating a zine instead of a photobook, with fewer images than a traditional photobook printed on paper. I have experience in creating zines in my ‘Islandness’ project, where I created two zines that I found to be very successful – I actually found the process of creating a zine to be much more enjoyable than making a photo book, as the number of images was much more manageable, and it meant I was able to streamline my layout and selection of images a lot more. For these reasons, I have considered making a zine instead of a photobook for my final exam project. If I make a photobook for my final exam, I plan to keep it simple by using a set amount of images, but also by using a simple layout: I will use a few presets of image layouts, favourite these, and stick to these throughout the book. This will ensure a clear flow of images in the book, with a clear and simple design.
As seen above in Kyler Zeleny’s work, I have thought about also using archival material of the places I photograph and juxtapose these with my new images. I used archival material and collage in two previous projects, but this project would use them in a different way, with landscapes and different types of material – for example old maps, landscape images, or articles. I plan to gain access to these by asking groups on Facebook, asking my family if they had anything of interest, and possibly contacting the Societe Jersaise Photographic Archive.
When and where do you intend to begin your study?
For my final exam project, I plan to execute at least 3 or 4 photoshoots. After researching key artists that will influence my decisions and photographs, I have a more clear idea of my starting points. Firstly, I thought it was a good idea to think about places across the west of the island that are important to me, and related to my childhood. The first of these locations is near my old house, at La Pulente, in St Brelade. I plan to drive to La Pulente and walk from my old house, down around the headland and down to the beach. This was a place I walked through every day when I lived there, and photographing this location is a good starting point to capture important landscapes. Following on from this, I plan to photograph down in the bay. I plan to photograph the sand dunes at la Braye, and also at Barge a Ground, further along. Particularly Barge is very important to me as I grew up on the beach at this spot, and my family has generational connections to the spot, through Jersey’s surfing and beach culture. Here, I want to capture important parts of the location: the wall, and its texture, the sunlight and reflections, and also the sand, which obviously is a key part.
I plan to take classic landscape images, but also capture more abstract images. I want to take these more abstract photographs in order to show the intricacies of a landscape that may be overlooked but to also develop the idea of childhood memory. As we get older, memories develop in our heads and change, and things from the past become ‘foggy’ or unclear. I want to highlight the idea of fragmented or distorted childhood memories, and I plan to do this by creating close-up, highly abstract images. that do not reveal too much of a location, but show its more detailed, conceptual components such as depth and light.
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20190516-why-you-cannot-trust-your-earliest-childhood-memories – a BBC article about the validity of childhood memories and how they change over time. “Memories are malleable and tend to change slightly each time we revisit them, in the same way, that spoken stories do,” says Loveday. They are influenced by our perceptions, state of mind, knowledge and even the company we are in when recalling events, which can lend us a new perspective on a familiar life event.” – From the article above.
