I observed for some time before beginning to photograph.
During my time of observing as when shooting, because of the Welsh Pandemic Lockdown, I was in an area of very restricted movement and only able to explore on foot. This limited my photographic area unless I was out running, at which times I shot exploratory images or occasionally as with the police car in the beach car park, had to shoot for the project with my I phone.
Once I’d completed my research, I had themes to focus on, and within a location I wanted to catch them as quiet as possible – though that was generally not hard.
When framing I kept in mind that there is a difference between what an eye sees and a camera records. However, I didn’t have to exclude from the frame items that would have changed the meaning; places were quiet and empty, but I did have to ensure that what I put in the frame would tell an obvious story, and to exclude any peripheral detail.
As a visual strategy I chose to present the images within a PowerPoint so that I had control over the way the images and text are viewed, so that I retain some control over the message, which is my voice. This I think was the best way to present the work on my blog as I must, however I am sure that if I were to show the images and text withing a gallery setting I could achieve the effect that I want.
I made a lot of changes to my first draft, mainly in response to my peer’s comments, though I knew that it contained too much material myself. I reduced the text, in some places separated text from the visuals, to let the visuals speak for myself, so that the images become my voice. I abandoned my initial idea of presenting facts with a white background, and opinions on grey background as that hadn’t worked and believe with my simpler presentation this separation will be self-evident. I did however present the press comments as in a newspaper column.
The photographs are extremely mundane, but it is the presentation that makes them interesting.
I have respected the visual elements and not added or subtracted from them.
Quality of outcome:
Once I had my concept it was challenging to think how to present it. I decided to take a tongue in cheek perspective, as I could then photograph what I saw, and shared the other layers of truth with the context and text I presented along-side the images.
The brief forced me to plan and execute the project methodically, this helped me to realise the project in a focused, timely, and coherent manner.
The brief of 15 images, when my plan suggested 4 to 5 themes, pushed me to find variations on subjects to achieve my plan.
I proved that the project had a wider scope than my previous work, both in the way that I expanded my search for context with research and recorded relevant information over a long duration.
Presenting my “truth” with just some trace of all the research that I’d done proved challenging. Initially I packed too much in, and then spent time paring the textual information down, discerning what was essential and what was distracting.
I hope that the current form and choice of images and text conceptualises my ideas effectively, and provides a complex narrative that viewers will be able to engage with it and even question.
Demonstration of creativity:
This was from the outset a personal project, chosen because the uncomfortableness of a situation, that gave me a purpose to look for the truth in of aspects of it.
I realised that as both an insider and outsider I was in a unique position to report on the issues and capitalised on this unusual position.
I knew that there were layers as well as shades of different types of truths contained in the opinions expressed by others, my feelings and the facts available. I decided to represent these layers of truth in a “tongue in cheek” style, to show my voice and to stimulate a response from the viewers.
My personal voice is represented in the images that I share, the text that I have chosen to accompany the photographs, and the way I have presented the work.
I have shown that images are open to those that want to take charge of them. However, I do think I’ve taken a risk and trodden a fine line as there must be some belief in the truth of photographs or they lose their value. I hope that the work does encourage questions.
The subjects photographed are mundane, but this is often the way with documentary photography- I hope the way I present them makes them interesting.
Context:
I believe that this time as I completed coursework and additional reading, I have traced the development of some of my thoughts and linked it to previous work and readings. This has helped me to contextualise my learning.
I have shown that I can synthesis and analyse information from many sources.
I really enjoyed the contextual research that I did, it was good to do self-directed research that served a self-designed purpose. I balanced information from the social media and press with more factual information from government sources and statistical reports. To obtain this balanced contextual background I covered political, social, and economic themes and enjoyed reading more widely around the truths in photography. This gave me a real meaning to the “cultural and political space of the photograph”. I was the author of the work in an knowledgeable and ethical manner.
As usual I reflected throughout the process, but more so as I contemplated the results of my research and moved into forming the presentation of my work.
Sharing with OCA peer groups throughout the process gave me challenge and support and encouraged regular reflection on my emerging work.
Continue working on your personal project and produce a photo essay of 15 images. Your work should demonstrate good research, a methodical approach and a wider scope than previous assignment work.
Decide on the best submission format for your work. Discuss your ideas with your tutor while you do the projects and exercises in Part Five. (Open College of the Arts, 2014:120)
Background information:
This personal project spans a year of reflection on the village of Newport (Tredraeth) Pembrokeshire. At the beginning of this time I was a second home owner, “exiled” from the village by the pandemic lockdown, observing the “temperature” of the place from afar. Mid way through the year I relocated there permanently. I have been an insider/outsider observer of the place for many years, known and accepted by many. Now that I have become a local, other’s experience tells me that it will take me years to be recognised as such.
As with everything this year, emotions have magnified, and voices have become louder. To rationalise what I was reading on social media and the press, I researched for facts to seek the cultural, political, social, and economic truths about the impact of visitors and second homeowners to this rural area, during the pandemic lockdown, and more generally as well.
Having discovered my “truth” I considered how to share this visually. My background reading of those such as Sekula, Tagg, Berger, Levi Strauss and Borge, increased my awareness that photographs are only representations of reality, part captured in the moment and the rest supplied by the photographer. Whilst I carry the responsibility and accountability of a documentary photographer to present reality, in this story I present various layers of truth, material, moral, impression and form. Images are never neutral, but having synthesised much information, as well as emotion, I have recorded and presented the truth as I understand it. I have recorded what my eyes saw. The text that accompanies the images is to support the truths I have discovered, rather than appropriate the images, as well as to provoke thoughts.
Photographs are not predictable communicators “they cannot carry meanings in any straightforward way” (Company, 202:8), but I have announced my path to this truth, and my position in it, though do hope that viewers will question the truths that I share.
References:
Campany, D. (2020) On Photographs. London: Thames and Hudson.
Open College of the Arts (2014) Photography 2: Documentary-Fact and Fiction (Course Manual). Barnsley: Open College of the Arts.
Artist statement:
This work is a personal reflection on aspects of a village, over a year. Though this has been an unusual time, the feelings and opinions felt and expressed, are simply magnifications of continued underlying tensions between locals and visiting outsiders. I have sought to uncover the truths that lie beneath these emotions, and share them here. These layers of truths are presented with integrity and research, though just as I have formed my own relationship with them, so may you.
Tutor hangout feedback meeting 25.2.21: This was to discuss my feedback on Assignment 4 Critical review, but we also discussed my proposal for assignment 5.
In her feedback my tutor queried several points about my assignment proposal. She asked me to:
Clarify my approach and undertaking in relation to the criteria: Critical and analytical skills, Develop intellectual understanding, Synthesis information, Communication skills
Would my proposal allow critical engagement with the blurring boundaries between fact and fiction/different truths?
How this assignment develops my work further from assignment 3?
When I first received my feedback I was puzzled, however I quickly saw that my proposal had not been explicit about these points and that much of the methodology, approach and workflow was in my head. By the time we had this discussion I think I had clarified the points myself and this is how I answered her questions:
I was able to explain how I realised that I hadn’t set out my methodology in my proposal: My intent is to move from the subjective social media comments that I have collected from face book, to collecting data and facts from various sources. Sources such as the Town council and government, press releases, property companies, census, and business owners. I will focus on facts about the house market (home ownership, house prices, rental opportunities), business demographics (proportion of income taken in the tourist season)and tourist demographics, to ascertain facts about the impacts of visitors to the community.
I explained that I will add to the collated social media comments from locals and visitors, demographic, economic and housing facts, from various gatekeepers. This will give me a better intellectual understanding of the situation and enable me to decide on my stance on the various issues. At the heart of this is a synthesising of the various voices, messages and information- the different truths- so that I can communicate my understanding of the concerns.
I described how this work is a progression from my assignment 3 work which identified the pressures of the rise in visitors to the town during the summer season, exemplified by the increased traffic in a car park. This work is of a much wider scope; assignment 3 was connotative of the issues, this expanded work allows me to denote more fully the concerns and issues arising from this phenomenon.
Extracts from my Assignment proposal:
Working title: Tensions arising from visitors.
Theme: Different sides of a story.
It’s a personal project, that began a year ago when I was in lockdown in England and not allowed to travel to my then “second home” in Pembrokeshire Wales. During this time I observed many discussions on social media about visitors to our “second” town, as well as Welsh national media highlighting lockdown infringements. The coverage was mostly one-sided and uncomfortable to read. As the year progressed and I travelled to my second home, I was able to gauge the real breadth of feeling from local residents to visitors; though not “local” I am well established in the community here and talk to people on both sides of the divide.
The second part of this year I have been resident here in what is now my only home where my research continued, capturing media articles and comments, knowing I would probably use the material for assignment 5. I added to this notes on conversations had, overheard and related.
Methodology: Photograph local contentious subjects such as, caravan parks, holiday houses, shops, roads, footpaths. Present images with short text/captions from research.
Further research: Photographers, and bodies of work to support my presentation approach, through websites, books, talks, and online interviews. I may also look at my archive of images, to compliment those that I shoot over the next month.
Approach: Probably a slideshow sharing images with overlaying text contradictory to each photograph, and possibly a third layer (perhaps audio) communicating another perspective on issues.
RESEARCH
I began with reading around “truth” in photography, investigating photographers’ who’ve written on the subject and photographic philosophies on the topic. I have written my responses to the thoughts of Allan Sekula, John Tagg, Levi Strauss, Borge and also explored other such as David Company “On photographs” (2020) and David bates Photography: The key concepts (2009).
I came away that there must be some belief in images or they lose their value. Therefore where there is power over an image the photographer, editor, curator, pubisher and so on there needs to be some transparency about their intention and influence. It is is also important that the viewers ask questions of an image, because a photograph can only be a representation of a reality, not reality itself.
My extended research led me down many rabbit holes, from a starting point of social media comments to Government web sites, Newspaper articles, council meeting minutes, letters from MPS, Tourism data sources, property information sources, and interviews with local business owners. I also attended some local virtual meetings.
My conclusion that there is a real trade off with local businesses and economies who need the income from tourists and the impact that this has local house prices and rental availability as well as some feelings of “invasion” at certain times of the year.
PHOTOGRAPHING
My work above showed emerging themes:
Tensions caused by tourism
Fears about Tourists and second home owners breading Covid lockdown rules
The dependency of the local economy on visitors
The impact of second home owners on the housing and rental markets.
I went out to photograph with these themes in mind. On the first 2 themes the evidence of tourists visiting was scant so I focused on representing this, empty streets, empty rental cottages, empty second homes, empty caravan and camping sites, empty car parks and so on.
For the 3rd theme, the local economy, again the visual evidence was different to many of the views expressed of food shortages and a lack of welcome by local businesses, as I photographed the local high street. The 4th theme, housing was different and I had to take a more representational approach as evidence of lack of affordable housing and long term rental housing is hard to capture.
I shot similar subjects and locations over a period of time to get the right light, weather and traffic (human and vehicular) conditions. They are all necessarily mundane subjects which I found less than inspiring to shoot so had to keep returning myself to the research and my intention to justify my photographing, but found the challenge of capturing the subjects in the manner that I wanted enough to maintain my momentum. At the time of shooting we were in a period of “Stay local” Covid 19 restrictions, which meant locally that you were not even allowed to drive for exercise, so I was restricted to photographing within walking distances. Most of my exploratory first images were taken on my I phone when out running or when walking locally for other purposes. I then returned with my larger camera on planned visits around, weather, light and time of day.
EDITING
During my editing I decided which images needed improving or taking from a different aspect. As I then began to put these to the text I had acquired I discovered where I had gaps and needed to photograph other subjects. My shooting was time limited as I needed to complete it before the area opened back up to tourists as this would have provided another perspective and a different story to that which I was writing. This was another story I could have written but it would have taken me past my course deadlines, it was a story that I already touched on in assignment 3. However it could be another project going forward.
PRESENTING
Early on I the work I thought that I would prefer to use four of five repeating images with varying text to show the different truths, Subjective social media, subjective press reports, Government and official reports, statistical data and my voice. However the brief is to use 15 images and having discussed this with my peers in an OCA hangout group I decided to present multiple images withina theme with different aspects against them.
This was my first draft of my power point documentary:
I shared my first draft with my peers in the Documentary/level 3 OCA hangout group. The feedback was really useful. I asked:
Should I give more context, perhaps in the title? but was told to keep the ambiguity.
Whether they could see my voice and what they thought my message was?
Some did realise that I was taking a tongue in cheek position and that the visuals are opposed to the text.
The fact that one peer asked me where I sat in the whole thing told me it wasn’t clear enough.
Some thought the message was about spreading corona virus, holiday homes
So I realised that my message wasn’t clear, nor was my voice.
No one had realised that I had put the subjective Facebook comments on a grey background, and facts on white background- so that hadn’t worked!
We discussed what I wanted to convey and how I could adjust to achieve this and to ensure the visuals come through. There were suggestions to:
Reduce the text
Separate the text in some places from the visuals
Put the facebook comments on ticker tape under the images
Present some facts without visuals on a text only page.
Afterwards I thought more about how to make it clear what my position is:
I need to really think about where I am in the story.
Let my voice speak in the visuals.
Make sure the work is really tongue in cheek.
Actions taken:
I pared down the text, by critically looking at each piece of text eliminating what is not essential.
I threw all the parts up in the air and looked at afresh, which enabled me to see it afresh and make decisions on what order was most effective for the various parts.
I chose to differentiate the factual text by giving the appearance of newspaper column print.
I experimented with ticker tape but then arrived at the idea that I’d like to viewers to see the images first and then with a delay provide the contradictory facebook comments. So I faded the text in after the image.
I reduced the backgrounds all to a simple white.
I have added an end note before the references to explain my unique position in the situation.
This is personal project. It began a year ago, I was in lockdown in England and not allowed to travel to my then “second home” in Wales. During this time, I observed many discussions on social media about visitors to our “second” town, as well as Welsh national media highlighting lockdown infringements. The coverage was mostly one-sided and uncomfortable to read. As the year progressed and I travelled to my second home, I was able to gauge the real breadth of feeling from local residents and visitors; though not “local” I am well established in the community here and talk to people on both sides of the divide.
The second part of this year I have been resident here in what is now my only home. I continued researching, capturing media articles and comments, knowing I would probably use the material for assignment 5. I have added to this note on conversations had, overheard and related. Now I need to develop a visual photographic response to this personal, and socio-political study. I would like to explore layers of truth, something that has interested me increasingly as I have progressed through the documentary course. Though my research has been during the coronavirus year 2020-2021, I don’t intend the work to focus on this; the research highlights local/societal/nationalist issues that exist normally, such as the economy, resources, housing, tourism, and hospitality businesses.
Working title: Tensions arising from visitors.
Theme: Different truths.
Methodology: Photograph local contentious subjects such as, caravan parks, holiday houses, shops, roads, footpaths. Present images with short text/captions from research.
Audience: Myself. I will create it for myself, depending on the outcome I might release to the community later as a healing tool; currently it would inflame the situation locally.
Further research: Photographers, and bodies of work to support my presentation approach, through websites, books, talks, and online interviews. I may also look at my archive of images, to compliment those that I shoot over the next month.
Approach: Probably a slideshow sharing images with overlaying text contradictory to each photograph, and possibly a third layer (perhaps audio) communicating another perspective on issues.
Photography 2: Documentary 