All Of The Things She Put Me Through: On Photography and Memory

(Disclaimer: I should warn you, there turns out to be quite a bit of Usher in this post)

Something about the way the light dances off a surface startles you, a subconscious stimulus causing you to turn just in time to notice a dying wisp of sound at the boundary of your perception, beyond which dreams and memories reside. You instinctively reach for the camera hanging at your hip, but before it reaches your eye the vanished reverie leaves you frozen, momentarily uncertain as to what caused you to stop in the first place.

Perhaps this has happened to you too, and you’ve experienced the uncanny way the subconscious whirl can occasionally spill into your waking hours. The way you can be somewhere new and suddenly experience an almost visceral certainty that some part of you has been here before, and that the only way to be sure is to capture it in your box of memories, a frame at a time.

The connection between visual images and memory has been extensively explored and has long occupied writers and researchers. The practice of photography lends itself to nostalgia of course, from the very act of capturing a single moment in time and space and the numerous decisions and omissions that this act involves, to the fact that the relentless development of photographic technologies and the torrential pace of image sharing practices confers an immediately archival status to each photograph we take. The materiality of printed photographs offers a tangible illustration of this encapsulation of memory, a fact that Alec Soth discusses here:

Artists often seem to play with this relationship, using the link to nostalgia and memory for creative or narrative purposes, but even if your intention is not to exploit this link it is worth being mindful that it exists, such is its pervasiveness in the collective consciousness.

As I’m writing this my mind’s going off on a tangent, to a song…I’m blaming Twitter for this one though as this man is probably on my mind at the moment due to how frequently he’s popped up on my feed over the last week or so as the subject of a meme. Anyway, in this song he puts forth a learned exposition on the connection between his visual perception and his memories and thus it is totally relevant!

Anyway, back to what I was saying…photography and memory, yes…

So, this is something that’s been bubbling away in my own work recently as I continue to slowly piece together something new. In recent weeks I’ve also had the pleasure of discussing this topic with some fellow photographers and have really valued their perspectives on this idea.

Working my way through some of my own childhood photographs, I’ve been experimenting with how altering these images and placing them alongside contemporary photos changes their reading. This is not a visual device that I invented, by any means. For example, Damien Williams uses this technique to great effect in his work Black Other.

Screen grab of some scanned childhood photos

What’s been most notable so far, aside from the technical challenge of making visually plausible adjustments to these photos, has been my emotional response to them. Working with these photos has stirred up quite unnerving emotions, often not directly related to the content of the pictures themselves or to a recollection of the events the photos depict. The photos have rather triggered a general sense of overwhelming wistfulness, a sense that the places and people contained within them have slipped into an adjacent timeline right alongside my own, of which I’m aware but that still remains stubbornly out of reach. It’s a weird thing and difficult to properly describe, but it’s been striking just how deep-rooted that feeling is and how readily it is summoned by even a few minutes with these old images.

The work I’m making in some way describes a journey and I guess every journey is about change. Maybe that’s what nostalgia is, an acute and sometimes jarring awareness of change. There is something almost mystical about it though isn’t there? Otherwise it would just be a straightforward memory, a factual recounting of previous happenings.

This elusive element is something that has always intrigued me and I’m often drawn to artists who find ways to represent this, or at least hint at a process of wrestling with this ‘thing’ in their work. Off the top of my head, Todd Hido’s Between the Two comes to mind as a body of work that gave me the same feels, like you’d seen these scenes somewhere, somehow before, almost subconsciously. Of course, this response is mediated by a range of our own personal experiences and memories so that no two people will respond in the same way to the work, but it’s an example that comes to mind.

In speaking with someone recently about this a question occurred to me: is nostalgia a tool that can be knowingly utilised at any time, at the artist’s discretion, or does it instead only show itself in the work through a process of the artist’s divination of their own subconscious? Do we only see it in the work when the practitioner finds a way to drag from within themselves an impression of their past or dreamworld, and reconstitute it in the present?

The answer to these questions feels like an unsolvable riddle, partly because it strays into the territory of suggesting that an objective and rational deconstruction of the artistic process is even possible and I’m not sure that it is. Also, the phrases ‘artist’s divination of their own subconscious’ and ‘artist’s discretion’ that I used above may actually be describing the same thing!

So, there we are. I’ll admit that this didn’t go where I thought it would when I started writing, but I guess where we’ve ended up is where we’re supposed to be.

I’m pretty sure there are hundreds of possible answers to these questions, a whole mountain range of different perspectives on how nostalgia and artistic practice are related, if indeed they are. As always, I’d be interested to hear yours if you care to share it.

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Werkhaus Zine Issue 3 will be available very soon

In other news, I’m delighted to have some work published in the forthcoming 3rd issue of Werkhaus Zine from Workhorse Collective, especially because the submission includes some stuff I wrote that’s related to the project I’m currently (very slowly) working on.

To have these reflections published alongside work in progress is really pleasing and probably also means I’m going to continue writing these blogs as well for the foreseeable (sorry!), to keep my ideas simmering away.

Next time it’ll probably be something about identity as that’s another theme currently occupying my brain warehouse. For now, I’ll leave you with the ubiquitous meme, so it can contaminate your mind like it’s done mine.

Till next time…

The past (dreams), the present and COVID-19

Phew, that's been a mad few months hasn't it! Writing now feels indulgent, almost as if we aren't still gripped by a pandemic, surrounded by the rubble of life as we knew it. Yet we must persist, stumbling forward through the murk, blindly hoping that better days lie ahead though we can’t yet see them.

I'm wondering how many of us have been challenged to reconsider our priorities in recent months. I certainly have, forced to examine so many best laid plans, exploded in moments by unforeseen virulence. How resilient are your dreams when faced with unprecedented obstacles? This is a question I'm still figuring out while trying to reconcile the unavoidable need to shift and adapt to changing circumstances.

One way to view the chaos of 2020 is as a bringer of opportunity (stay with me!), as surely the people who will weather the COVID storm most successfully are those who’ve been able to pivot most easily, to identify and hold on to the most crucial things and willingly let go of everything else, moving forward into the unknown with an optimistic lightness. 

Since last writing in May I've been obliged to switch focus from the project I was developing then, following the award of a bursary by the Midlands-based photographic network ReFramed to make some work that examines the experience of COVID-19 by Black and Asian communities. There’s clearly a lot to cover there, and with only two months to submit I’ll be working diligently to distill all the potential themes and content down to a coherent small body of work. A different challenge to anything I've done previously, but an exciting one for sure. I'll be documenting the progress of this work here over the next few weeks, with a view to discussing some of the underlying themes and providing some background to the process.

There have been too many tragedies arising from the last few months, so much suffering, it's difficult to make sense of it all. One of the most striking things for me has been the many contrasts and conflicts that have arisen, provoked by an unseen but deadly enemy, that has unmasked a number of fault lines in our society and way of life. The haves and have nots, the disproportionate devastation wrought by the virus in communities of colour, the shielders and the minimum wage front line workers...in each pocket of society, forced into isolation from each other by the virus, there is a different story to tell.

The world is unrecognisable to all of us now and the future is uncertain. Amidst this of course, some have been confronted by the traumatic reiteration of violent systemic racism and embedded social injustice. This seems to overshadow everything for me currently, an horrific exclamation mark on an already terrible year, amplifying the pain of various COVID-related hurts. The effects of racism are an inescapable burden, whose weight varies from day to day but from which you are never relieved. Lately it's sunk right down into the bones of everything, burning and aching and causing a nagging restlessness. 

One of the things I've never reconciled is the apparent indifference and ignorance of some, who have remained blissfully unaware that life is fundamentally different for others in ways that have been graphically illustrated in recent times. A benefit of privilege I suppose, but it's evident that injustice can only really survive in an environment of indifference, it can only thrive where blissful ignorance does also. One of the consequences of the pain awoken by recent events is a stark realisation that I can't be party to the indifference any more, being a quiet bystander is just not tenable any longer. I have to do something, say something, be part of solutions rather than a silent sufferer and co-conspirator. It's way past time. 

Being an active force for change requires focus, understanding of one’s sphere of influence and a plan. The first tentative steps in my plan will be making this work for ReFramed. There's been a big focus in some quarters on the fact that people from Black and Asian communities have been disproportionately affected by COVID-19. There's been a lot of speculation, theorising and hand-wringing, as there has been about other perturbing facts of the last few months. One thing that has been unsurprisingly lacking though is any sense of urgency to take tangibly effective action to address this issue. Reports are commissioned, risks assessments are mandated but what comes next? Again, we are victims of the paralysis of indifference and of the unfortunate fact that nobody seems able to muster the energy to concentrate on an issue for more than a moment if it isn't directly and continuously affecting them personally. The capacity to empathise and thus to step forward as an active advocate or ally seems in short supply. So energy then and determination are needed, to overwhelm indifference and demand attention for long enough for something, anything to really change. 

The Government announces another commission to investigate the mysteries of ethnic disparities.

What's this got to do with photography Justin? Well, visual media has played a critical role in all of the issues discussed above. What did you think when yet another photograph of an unfortunate front line worker dead from COVID flashed up on the news? What message was portrayed when Boris Johnson broadcasted from his isolation looking clearly unwell? How different would the last few months have been if nobody had been there to record as a policeman knelt on George Floyd’s neck?

Photography has had a pivotal role in shaping the perceptions of minority communities in the minds of a supposedly enlightened Western society almost since the inception of the medium. So much of this indoctrination is now so deeply embedded in our understanding of the world it is incredibly difficult to unpick, and certainly impossible to do so if one is indifferent to, or willingly ignorant of, the power of imagery and its role as a fundamental tool in the wielding of power by one group over another. It's incumbent on us then to question how imagery is used, to challenge it when its use clearly has malign intent and seek to recruit the power of photography for a more positive purpose, that of bringing to light elements of life that have been previously and repeatedly misrepresented or simply unseen. By doing so, one hopes to contribute to a cumulative effort to reframe prevailing narratives and bring more reality and balance to public discourse about sensitive issues.

It’s clear that we are living through a time of individual and collective reckoning, where previously unquestioned practice is being looked at from a more informed standpoint and being shown to be in fact highly questionable (see Magnum Photos). It’s incumbent on every practitioner in a visual medium to reflect on what their own role is in the bigger picture.

What’s New?

Despite not being outwardly productive in recent times, I’ve been quietly plotting some new work. In addition to this, I’ve also been fortunate that the work I started during my MA has continued to generate discussion and act as an opening to new opportunities. 

One of these opportunities came as the result of some images from ROITD being selected to be shown in the first exhibition of Shutter Hub’s ambitious new project. Postcards From Great Britain aims to share visions of British culture through photographic images and promote connection and debate. The images include social, political, observational, historical and traditional responses and when the project finally closes, at the end of this year, the submitted work in its entirety will be archived and housed in various significant collections worldwide. 

Images are presented in postcard format, depicting visions of British life

The project will be punctuated with exhibitions throughout Europe, the first of which opened this week and a happy coincidence of my work schedule allowed me to nip over to Haarlem, just outside Amsterdam, to attend the exhibition opening. It was good to be there and I was happy to be able to meet a number of the other exhibiting artists and discuss how they work. These connections stimulated a couple of promising avenues for future exploration and possible collaboration and I’ll expand on this in future updates. 

Attendees at the exhibition opening in Haarlem

Apart from enjoying the short break for the opportunity to see the exhibition, I was also able to get out for a quick photo walk and the mental space of being away also allowed me to continue planning for the main focus of this year, which will be an exhibition of my own work in collaboration with selected artists, later this year. 

My own research for this is ongoing: I recently finished reading Catch by Simon Robson. The book centres around Catharine (referred to as Catch by her husband), a wife alone at home on a winter’s day while her husband works away in Birmingham. She is bored, self-critical, over analytical, aloof, over-serious, frustrated by a lack of musical talent, envious of other more frivolous/artistic/bohemian people, embodied in this case by her friend Masha.

She is also, evidently, dissatisfied by her inability to have a child with her husband Tom. 

Cover of Catch by Simon Robson

The writing is often overly elaborate, to the detriment of the narrative and the revelation of character. However the author still manages to depict an unraveling, a sense of quite rapidly losing touch with oneself and the certainty of circumstances that previously anchored you in place. Catharine quickly loses touch with her sense of self, caught up in an accelerating cycle of thoughts, careering towards the dissolution of her marriage, the destruction of her longstanding friendship with Masha and to the relinquishing of her sanity, triggered by innocuous events such as a conversation with a disaffected teenager in the village and some low level flirting with a retiree.

This feeling of being captive to self-destructive thoughts, apparently founded on ‘fact’ that one is mistakenly convinced of, felt very familiar. This negative feedback spiral can be a very lonely place, where you feel increasingly hopeless, convinced of the futility and finality of everything, and almost unable to listen to reason. This is something I will be exploring in the work that I plan to show later this year.