Where did I begin?

The areas of interest that developed during my Level 2 Landscape and Documentary work brought me to the beginning of this work. I acquired a curiosity about layers of truth. I also had a desire to continue exploring landscape but in an immersive slow manner with attention to the ordinary, drawing on my subconscious. Having recently moved to a new location I chose to focus on two things in my then current experience, firstly the ancient woodlands that drew me in, and secondly the disharmony and animosity to ‘incomers’ in the local community.

My intention was to represent my feelings about community through equivalents in the unnoticed and ordinary within the woodland landscape. I began by exploring visual representations of elements of ancient woodland communities as metaphors for characteristics that could be beneficial in human communities.

Other Influences on my Body of Work

My research for Contextual Studies on ‘affect’ and ‘effect’, or ‘mirrors’ and ‘windows’ in landscape photography, particularly in the work of Minor White, opened further possibilities for my Body of Work photography. My work in both the courses was symbiotic – they developed and enriched each other.  A broad range of photographers influenced my work from Alfred Steiglitz, John Blakemore, to contemporary photographers such as Rob Hudson. Guy Dickenson and Gregor Radonic. I have also been affected by critical feedback from my peers given in student hangouts I have shared my work, just as with my Tutor.

Experimentation

I experimented with a variety of visual strategies such as changes in scale and perspective, macro and micro, abstraction, blurring, and symbolism. As I worked into the project I became more concerned with being a ‘mirror’, than opening a window for others to a world of realism. To do this I developed a keener sense of seeing, slow looking, and immersion in my surroundings, and experimented with psychogeography and mindful photography. Eventually my looking became increasingly defocused, or ‘bottom up’, led by the landscape and my subconscious, rather than led by conscious intent. This to the point towards the end of the project where I was less keen to photograph and happier to pre- visualise; certainly, my image capturing decreased significantly.

Difficulties I encountered

Initially I struggled to get to the knub of my idea and to focus my intent. It took until assignment 3 to drill down into this enough to move forward more confidently. Another difficulty, which I am still working on, is how to signpost my subconscious ideas and messages for viewers. Also adapting to the dynamic natural environment that I was photographing was challenging, but I enjoyed finding ways to overcome the constant changes, turning them to my advantage and overcoming technical difficulties.

My critical positioning and personal voice

My work is a combination of landscape and conceptual photography. By representing my feelings through equivalents and metaphors in visual objects, I can transform abstract ideas in my head, my subconscious, into something concrete, via a physical representation of another subject. I can put something of myself in the landscape without intervening in it, and believe that my voice, my subconscious, is in my images. I edit purposefully, with stronger confidence, and combining instinct with intention. I have discovered and show how a photographer may use the landscape to form new relationships and meaning. This is my emerging voice.

What I will take forward

I am enjoying and will continue to use visual metaphors and put my subconscious in the images. This will be in tandem with going deeper visually and spiritually into ancient woodlands.

I am still developing methods for signposting my intentions or messages. I have tried various techniques to signpost images to increase access to their meaning, definitions as captions, poetry, poetography, and binary pointers. Looking forward I need to find ways to share the messages in my photography with an audience, whilst not excluding the opportunity for viewers to decide for themselves what meaning they take from the images.

My intention is to build on this body or work and refine my publishing ideas to create a photobook, or Zine to realise a publication for Sustaining Your Practice.