“HERE and THERE” is an exploration of childhood in a postmodern world. The work is divided into two series, the first entitled HERE and the second THERE. Taken on black and white film, HERE explores the relationships between childhood and modernism. In contrast, THERE is an exploration of postmodernism through the use of colour film, which is then heavily digitised. This deliberate choice in colour/digital medium encourages the viewer to explore the technological dominance of a postmodern childhood.
PART 1 // HERE
Shot on 35mm film and hand processed, HERE speaks to a slower, more idealistic time.
The collection of pictures (not all featured here due to upload limitation) were taken over a six month period in a sleepy residential street in regional Australia. Each of our pre-teen subjects represent purity, wholesomeness and the innocence of a single truth inherent to modernity. The use of black and white film, which disrupts time and space (are these children of the 60’s, 70's or now?) further enshrines modernity into each picture.
Despite the timeless innocence of the children in these frames, their childhood is one that is firmly rooted in the postmodern world. These are the children of post-modern parents, and have only ever known a world of composite identities, cultural constructs, cynicism and exponential technological growth.
PART 2 // THERE
THERE speaks to the fragmented truths, and persistent representations of self that define the postmodern world in which our children are growing up. Each of these images are shot on colour film, and then twice digitised; firstly by printing low quality mini-lab prints of each negative, and then by taking i-phone pictures of the said mini-lab prints.
Combined with images (again, representations) of text from Guy Debord's “The Society of Spectacle” (not featured here due to upload limitation), these images explore the extent to which the lives of our children are increasingly lived out through representations of reality, versus the lived experience of reality itself.
To quote Debord directly,
"In societies where modern conditions of production prevail, all life presents as an immense accumulation of spectacles. Everything that was directly lived has moved away into a representation."
