At this moment in time I’m still unsure of the route I want to go down in terms of finding a somewhat niche in this project and where I want to go from here so I decided that instead of just accepting the photographers we have been given in lectures I am going to find some photographers of my own that I feel depict this theme. I am hoping that this process will help me in terms of finding my niche as well as giving me ideas from which I can develop my own.
At the moment I have been thinking about the theme of abandonment and maybe focussing on graffiti.
Paul Batt
These images are part of the ‘Abandon series’ by Batt and feature photographs of abandoned sofas in suburban Australia and link into the theme that I was thinking of about of abandonment, this series is documenting the streets of Australia and is showing the small details between houses within a suburban environment. I feel it’s the juxtaposition of the once quite personal and intimate objects being out of place on the side of the road which creates a story around the people that once owned it and so adding to the theme of absence of this human presence but still telling a great deal about the person which is the aim of this topic.
Cari Ann Wayman
Wayman is a 23 year old photographer from Illinois and despite all her bodies of work I am going to focus on the theme of abandonment, photographing the left behind and forgotten about places and objects. It’s these unusual and unique objects that tell the viewer a great deal about the person who used to own these objects without featuring the person themselves. I think that these images show this distressed building but also tell a story of the people living there previously and about the people behind the possessions. The colour scheme included within these images adds to this distressed look and theme of abandonment, the sepia tone makes it look as if the actual photograph has been abandoned itself.
Paul Politis:
Self -taught photographer originally from Montreal in Quebec specialises in black and white photography and started photography with the original darkroom process in 1988 and later moved onto the digital method in 2005. After coming up with the theme of abandonment I later discovered that Politis has also done a series on abandoned places and so acting as inspiration for me surrounding this theme.
I really feel like this work embodies this theme of depicting human presence without a human being present, apart from the obvious things such as the houses it’s the smaller details that also represent this like the boarded up windows, broken fence and material covering the window. This represents the owners of the house as well as the person/people that boarded up the windows telling a story about the people that have been involved with this process or who used to live there and so relating to our theme as a human hasn’t been photographed. However, if this is the route I do choose to go down I think that I may focus on the more subtle details, maybe the litter dropped around these buildings and the way the windows were boarded up, any marks left by the owners. or any presence of others coming close to the building.
Graffiti
Coincidentally Politis has also done a series on graffiti and so linking into one of my other ideas relating to the theme given. I feel like this follows on nicely from what I was saying previously about noticing the smaller detail as these are likely to tell us more about the type of person that was last at this location. Here are some examples of ‘Graffiti’ and although no humans are present within these photo’s the graffiti gives it away that a person was once here and so I personally feel a sense of that person left behind in their graffiti as it often includes opinions and statements saying a lot about the person.
Graffiti?
Whenever I walk past graffiti I personally see it as a work of art and it makes me wonder who actually did it and the story behind some of these quite meaningful pieces of ‘street art’, because of the story I attach to the graffiti I felt it very necessary to link it into this topic as it is showing that someone has been in that particular location before hence showing human presence. It seems almost secretive as the person doesn’t want to get caught so representing this topic of absence of human presence. It was this concept of not wanting to get caught which links into the work of the famous and secretive Banksy.
Banksy…
I couldn’t help myself but to include the master of graffiti since we were on the topic, Banksy who is a graffiti artist as well as a film director and painter is from the U.K and I feel the fact he is very secretive and it’s unclear as to what he actually looks like fits in with the absence of human presence as his work tells a story and is very distinctive but without him being present hence the link. He has strong political views which are emphasised in his work and so representing our task as we get a sense of his views without actually picturing or even seeing him and so demonstrating it’s the smaller things that can be responsible for saying much more than photographing a person ever would.
How about combining the two?
I’m not sure which if any of these initial ideas I am going to follow but how about combing the two? Maybe looking at abandonment which could include graffiti amongst other things and so combining both ideas into one with the initial theme focussed on the broader topic of abandonment and then going into the more subtle details such as the graffiti at these abandoned sites?
Isobel Woolley Photography 