Mixing the Old and New

Taking images with a medium format camera on film is such a different experience within photography than your average point and click. And taking these images into Photoshop just opens up even more options. I decided to go against my usual ethic of keeping 'doctoring' to the minimum and went all out by using a photograph taken on 120 film and editing the . out of it.

Mona Hatoum

Recently visiting the Tate, I stumbled across this specific photograph by Mona Hatoum:

Mona Hatoum - Performance Still 1985

Concept thinking again it would seem. Again and again my path leads me past this concept of conceptual thinking. The concept here is to conceptualise ideas and thought into concepts that speak and talk. Concepts. 

In conceptual art the idea or concept is the most important aspect of the work. When an artist uses a conceptual form of art, it means that all of the planning and decisions are made beforehand and the execution is a perfunctory affair. The idea becomes a machine that makes the art.

This quote by John Suler illustrates exactly what I'm experiencing lately. But to take it further, does that mean images can be ugly but still attract an audience if the concept is right? I think that this is the debate here, ugly versus pretty photographs. Everyone likes pretty (pretty here is aesthetically pleasing) visuals, but is it not so much more important to also find your way to at least appreciate the ugly? 

So am I doing a good thing here?

I don't even know how to start this entry, my head feel like it is surrounded by clouds, I struggle typing fast and accurately and knowing that so much needs to be done, typed and justified, not only here. I find that for the last couple days photography became just a thing for me, and it's not a good thing. I am not seeing the beauty in it or the deeper understandings but I see it as effort, of hopeless ideas which transform into burdens. And yes I am again not inspired and after looking at ideas and images I feel that I don't appreciate them anymore, they become useless and purely skill driven, having nothing to do with thought. That was never my aim, my aim was to create art that speaks, how cliche it might sound. 

Fair enough, I didn't get enough sleep the last couple of days which might have a massive impact on all this, but I feel angry because I want to feel creative and motivated again. 

This is to much information that has nothing to do with photography but unfortunately this post will be just that. Moaning. Because sometimes we just have to moan. And no-one want's to hear it because it creates unpleasant atmospheres and feelings but maybe sometimes it must be forced to take the audience out of their comfort zone. So am I doing a good thing here?

Over-share

I'm scared, scared to write something again because it was so long ago. It's like I see this entry window where I am writing this in for the first time and it feels strange, but I can't decide who is the stranger of us two.

In the last couple of weeks I had some great and some pretty studpid ideas and thoughts and will try to give a quick run down of some of them here:

Before I start, I must say I was a little reluctant to post my ideas in such a free giving manner where everyone has access to them, and I still think it's a little silly, but I realised that today I want to inspire people and give them ideas for their own ideas.

 

Please understand that all ideas and rough drawings above are my personal work (and thus fall under my copyright) and the concepts depicted will be completed by photographing them as part of an exhibition series.  

What I'm saying is please don't steal, be inspired!!!

Keep shooting

That's the key, to keep shooting images.. not to get lazy but to remember the medium and to go on.

Today was such a day where I took the camera and tried some stuff again. Instead of thinking about concepts and ways to execute them, a simple portrait was the result of playing around with my camera... a portrait of my dear sister (visit her blog here).

Planning an exhibition

Planning an exhibition is a quite a task. But I find that by starting with a theme things might fall into place.

At the moment I am still conducting research with regards to the artists I would like to showcase who fit the theme, who would enhance the visual experience of the audience and so fourth. The theme here I won't mention yet but I will showcase a video that might underline the ideas I have. And forget the dolls, feel how you feel.






And to add to this post, a further video that has the same effect, or rather affects us in a certain way. That feeling we get when watching it is what is important!