Dead Insect in My Parents Pool
“... there is such a thing as poetic, ecstatic truth. It is mysterious and elusive, and can be reached only through fabrication and imagination and stylization” Werner Herzog1
At first glance they seem almost like scientific specimens, removed from any obvious environment, carefully and obviously composed. However, when contextualised by the title, the idea is that they start to tell a story, to document, albeit somewhat obliquely, the context of having water in a country where many people do not. It is both tragic, but also absurd, that in Kenya many many people do not have enough water to drink yet some have enough to fill swimming pools with. However, rather than tell this story through images of drought and opulence, I focussed on drowned insects in a swimming pool. The idea is to acknowledge this wealth chasm using strategies of irony and scale; the insects, but to also acknowledge my own presence within the context; the title.
Yet are these images of dead insects really documentary photos? On the one hand, yes, these are careful observations of an environment, and images that document specific dimensions of that world. But on the other hand, the relationship between these images and the context that they speak about does seem much more tangental than in traditional documentary. In fact, without the title, what could be deduced from these pictures of dead insects? Yet, without a title, what could be deduced from an image of a drought stricken country? Probably a bit more... or maybe not. Maybe it would simply further cement the received images that already exist in our collective imagination.
I am trying to find ways to take documentary photos which are enigmatic and difficult to attribute one single 'meaning' too, but which nonetheless address a specific, real and existing situation. To do this with expected and 'understandable' images, seem to me to result in almost claustrophobic images that seemed to restrict the viewers' imaginative space. Working with ambiguous images, images which have a range of possible meanings, is my attempt to open up the process of how an image is received. Rather than directing viewers into one way of reading, the idea is to trigger a dynamic relationship with the photos; a relationship in which the stories and environments presented can be both actively imagined and experienced.
At first glance they seem almost like scientific specimens, removed from any obvious environment, carefully and obviously composed. However, when contextualised by the title, the idea is that they start to tell a story, to document, albeit somewhat obliquely, the context of having water in a country where many people do not. It is both tragic, but also absurd, that in Kenya many many people do not have enough water to drink yet some have enough to fill swimming pools with. However, rather than tell this story through images of drought and opulence, I focussed on drowned insects in a swimming pool. The idea is to acknowledge this wealth chasm using strategies of irony and scale; the insects, but to also acknowledge my own presence within the context; the title.
Yet are these images of dead insects really documentary photos? On the one hand, yes, these are careful observations of an environment, and images that document specific dimensions of that world. But on the other hand, the relationship between these images and the context that they speak about does seem much more tangental than in traditional documentary. In fact, without the title, what could be deduced from these pictures of dead insects? Yet, without a title, what could be deduced from an image of a drought stricken country? Probably a bit more... or maybe not. Maybe it would simply further cement the received images that already exist in our collective imagination.
I am trying to find ways to take documentary photos which are enigmatic and difficult to attribute one single 'meaning' too, but which nonetheless address a specific, real and existing situation. To do this with expected and 'understandable' images, seem to me to result in almost claustrophobic images that seemed to restrict the viewers' imaginative space. Working with ambiguous images, images which have a range of possible meanings, is my attempt to open up the process of how an image is received. Rather than directing viewers into one way of reading, the idea is to trigger a dynamic relationship with the photos; a relationship in which the stories and environments presented can be both actively imagined and experienced.
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