I want to use this post to record what I have been up to with my project over the last few (several) weeks and how it is developing.
Having shown my work at several review sessions recently, and subsequent to my last Assignment 4 submission; including the Barnsley residential and 2 Scotland study group sessions, I concluded that this work needed an extra push before deciding that it is finished. This is in itself a bit of a risk as I only have Assignment 5 to go which is when I should really be putting the finishing touches to it rather than creating quite a new presentation to it. If I make a mess then I will have little opportunity within the OCA structure to recover it again. Having said that, I think that it is an important process I need to go through before relying on my own judgement of its completeness.
While the three critique events have been really useful to gain feedback, reactions and advice, I haven’t taken all of it literally. I have taken bits and pieces from all the feedback but the main message and consensus was that I needed to do a bit more to engage the viewer with the work. I have therefore been doing a lot of thinking about the work, perhaps more so than actually doing the changes, but I think that I am now at a stage where I have a good idea of where this is going and what the eventual outcome will be.
As a teaser, these are some of the decisions and changes I am working on:
- The title of the work will most definitely be ‘Land Values’. I have played around with alternatives but have now realised how important this is to the focus of the work and how it binds the different elements together.
- The two halves of this project will now be split into two books which are further bound down one edge to create a single product which creates a four page spread book layout. Two pages will relate to Thornhill and two pages to Glasgow; but with the book working best when all four pages are viewed together.
- I have shifted away from the plan to have juxtaposed photos from Thornhill and Glasgow being composed along similar structural elements i.e. similar position of strong horizontals or verticals, etc. This has allowed greater freedom to ‘play’ with the dialogue between the two sets of images.
- There is going to be a greater use of text interplayed with the images which will use research on the term ‘value’, as well as introducing a more political edge to some of the commentary on society’s differing values for land. This should make the work a little less vague, which has its advantages and disadvantages, but I have been inspired a little by the work of ‘Kennardphillipps’, and thus feel more comfortable in introducing a slightly more political edge to the work.
- In relation to aesthetics, the work will retain its ordinary and banal selection of images which is important in its slightly ironic presentation of these places, but there is likely to be a more edgy and run down feel to the Thornhill images and a more upbeat presentation of the Glasgow photographs – but don’t want to go over the top with this though.
That’s about it really, except I now need to do less thinking and begin to pull this work towards its conclusion.
Major Project 