Viewing Nigel Shafran’s and Tom Sach’s work has helped inform the direction that I wish to follow with this assignment. Looking at their work has been beneficial in helping decide to follow a multi-strand approach to the brief. By that, I mean to incorporate still life scenes (aide memoire images), still life objects equated to labour (power tools) and self-portrait representative of workplace environment. As much as the assignment is about self-portrait I also want to establish a connection to labour and manual endeavour.
For a while I’ve wrestled with the notion of including images of me undertaking my work, thinking that it would be good to include actual work-based practice. I can’t say that I was particularly pleased with any of the resulting images though, they tended to lack dynamism or visual impact, they were just boring and if I had seen them anywhere else I’d have probably thought…yeah, so what!
So instead I decided to follow a more abstract version of myself, one that alludes to the rigours of labour and that is less obvious, making the viewer make their own connections.
I also made a couple of short time-lapse films https://vimeo.com/user4294756, but am as of this moment unsure about including them in the final submission. Although I like them they do have a slightly gimmicky quality – time-lapse to me, means Benny Hill. No, actually, those last words mean I am sure, they can stay on the cutting room floor.
Context and Narrative 