Concept: I plan on taking a series of color photographs of my everyday objects to create an extended portrait of myself experiencing quarantine. Due to the current situation, I’m separate from the spaces and relationships I’ve contextualized my life within for years. To communicate that confusion I’d like to remove these objects from their contexts. I want to do this not just by removing them from their natural resting place, but also by removing visual cues of time and weight. This will lead to a series of portraits of my objects that should feel otherworldly, fantastical, and slightly disconcerting.
Technical approach: I’m going to use my 18-55mm lens, with a fairly small depth of field achieved by a combination of zoom, distance, and aperture. To remove the appearance of time and place I will be shooting using entirely artificial light sources. To further remove the sensation of gravity I’ll be using unusual points of view to obscure the earth plane, close-ups, and potentially some suspensions. The creation of the images will be actively participatory, so I’m going to use the built-in timer on my camera along with a tripod.
Consumption: This collection would either be experienced through a View-Master with a good clicky mechanism, or projected on one end of a series of small black rooms along a single corridor. The idea would be complete visual immersion. Auditorily the participant would either experience the mechanism of the View-Master or the very distinct sound of others trying to be quiet, opening and shutting squeaky doors and shuffling around.
RESPONSE FROM REBECCA
Felix,
Your project proposal is incredibly well articulated in each of the three sections, and a pleasure to read.
In terms of “communicating confusion” through decontextualization and a sense of weightlessness, look at Irina Rozovsky’s Miracle Center. You can use frozen motion, Photoshop layering, and a variety of other techniques to achieve this; my sense is that you already have some ideas of how to go about making this happen photographically, including the artificial (isolating?) light sources you describe. Keeping the manipulation to the camera (rather than the post-production) may keep the project clean and allow for a certain degree of discipline and serendipity. For the pure sake of situating yourself within a photographic lineage, check out Berenice Abbott’s “Bouncing Ball in Diminishing Arcs” (1958-61). You might also be interested in the work of Barbara Probst. She uses a specific technique of photographing a single moment in multiple simultaneous exposures using a radio controlled system, but some of her still life work has the qualities you describe of mystery and absence of gravity. Look at the still life images of Jan Groover; they are seminal in the field and occasionally your work this semester has reminded me of her aesthetic. Paul Biddle is a surrealist photographer who uses a highly refined approach to color, lighting and composition, particularly in series like Out of the Obscure. Brittany Marcoux, a recent alum of MassARt’s MFA program, also created a thesis body of work, From the Inside Looking Out, which might be of interest to you not only in terms of the individual images but the installation that took form in her MFA Thesis exhibition.
The long-term goals for “consumption” of the work are exciting and fresh, in terms of the use of sound, installation, and interactivity, and will help us to imagine a life for the project beyond the stage of completion that we’re able to see next month.
-R
This is such a good idea quarantine self portraiture.
Felix, the word that comes to mind is Fantasy when reading your proposal and I am really exited about it.
I think you are up to something really really special. I can already imagine myself sitting at a quiet room at a museum with the projector slide showing the images that are just way out there, showing lots of vulnerability and emotion.
I don’t have any words of advice just clapping my hands and excitedly waiting to see the result!
Best of luck, Natalia
Felix — I’m excited to see the photographs you produce! Your photos so far have been so effective at eliciting a sensations for me so I am especially interested for the fantastical and disquieting sense you are aiming for here. I love your idea of using artificial light sources to add to the sense of an item out of its normal environment and look forward to seeing (or rather, hearing about after the fact) the creative options you pick.
I’m excited for this. Portraiture through everyday inanimate objects is a fascinating idea. I’m interested to see how an object’s role and significance in your everyday pandemic life will be communicated when its context is removed. The point about using artificial light to “remove appearance of time and place” is smart.