My Journey Through Body of Work with OCA
Following on from Showing Not Telling – Text and Image to Form Diegesis , I've been inspired to make 9 more poems for the remaining diptychs. In my opinion text has been used in a totally different way (relay as opposed to anchorage) to inform the images.
Kris Belden-Adams in Beyond "This-Caused-That”: The Temporal Complexities of Before-and-After Photographs (2017) re-articulates the account of how a diegesis works in a comic strip in Barthes' Rhetoric of the Image (1964). When both text and photographs supplement each other under the same idea, a diegesis is formed (Belden-Adams, 2017). A diegesis is a kind of overall narrative consisting of the like-minded fragments that make it up.
As I alluded to in the post Showing Not Telling, I have decided to make a post detailing how I make a map-based approach to titling the diptychs for my body of work. One of my concerns with map-based titling was that the project should have something to do with a map in the first place. I feel in retrospect that this isn't necessarily true. The concept that drives the project doesn't have to start by drawing a circle on a map for instance in order for the project to be titled this way. Instead the map can be a tool that embellishes the project, by inviting the viewer to delve deeper into the map or coordinates that point to the map.
Some questions have been floating around in my head concerning my project for Body of Work so far. These questions are based around how/if it relates to regeneration and these questions inevitably lead to more questions! I have therefore jotted some of them down in an attempt to provide answers to at least a few of them.
My photographs in the past have been quite literal; not leaving much to the imagination. In other words telling, not showing. Often I’ve left the text anchor out because I thought it wasn’t necessary. For me if text is there as an anchor it should help inform the viewer, inviting them to dig deeper, without just describing the image. Conversely, if text is there as a relay it should have a rapport with the images, bouncing back reflexively. I feel I am quite an imaginative person and strangely this reflects back to the viewer as not leaving much to the imagination. Perhaps because I have tried to squeeze a lot of information into the image, there isn’t much more room for interpretation.
I have decided to make what seems will be a pretty boring post concerning the logistics of my composite making and the selection of location from which to photograph from. I feel this is necessary because it is useful firstly as a reference point to remind myself of why I’m making the choices I’ve arrived at. Some of these reasons are practical while others are more thought out. The other use for making this post is that I might arrive at realisations I hadn’t conceived before writing this down.
Since developing a strategy for photographing change (specifically regeneration and everyday change in Deptford) in a documentary style, I have been aware of one way that chance is affecting my images. Therefore I am interested to address the factor of chance in photography and to see whether chance can or is affecting my work in any other way.
