The day after I started this assignment I had a email from Lensculture.com informing me that the results of the ‘Visual Storytelling Awards’ we announced.
I thought this was a great place to start my research.
I was really interested in the work of Julia Fullerton Batten. Her project was called ‘Old Father Thames’ 2018. She re-enacted scenes from history that had taken place, or involved, the River Thames.
This to me was story telling in photography in its purest form. Each picture clearly tells a story from the incident/event. It also tells you a story about the individuals photographed and frames a story of society at the time of the event.
https://www.juliafullerton-batten.com/gallery.php?catNo=1&gallNo=87&photoNo=8
On the whole…. for photographs to tell a story a series of photos have a greater impact than an individual photo? Obviously there are individual photographs which are amazing at telling a story (see Tania Franco Klein below), however as a general rule..????
The Lensculture award for a single image went to Tania Franco Klein (below).
ttps://www.taniafrancoklein.com/proceed-to-the-route/eskpbf0cnotqy4ypal5iyakh6q4xzb
I was really intrigued by this image and really like her work. I decided to use this image as the first i would make notes and try and work out what’s going on….
Most of my points are asking questions without giving a conclusive summary of what i think the story is… I guess there will be a certain amount of subjectivity. I think its safe to say the image is ambiguous for sure. Is the ambiguity what makes it so appealing and interesting?
The official description of what’s going on in this image is….
It is in the emptiness of the countryside that one can situate an encounter of an old lifestyle that still waits for its abandonment and containment, reflecting the new growth of a central capitalist system. The drifters and travellers, all passing through some state of nothingness, that share private moments in public spaces, are a clear example of the ephemeral, crowded, and at the same time almost empty, leftovers of contemporary cities.—Tania Franco Klein
I’ll be honest when i say that’s not what I what I was thinking about..but it makes sense.
The next photo I decided to look at and make notes on about the narrative/story was a photo from Stuart Roy Clarke called ‘H’away the lads’ from his book The Game.
add text re Documenting Britain and Loius Day
Text re Duane Micheals
Simple storytelling. I was putting together a photographic journal of my walk down a beach in North Devon and became really interested in the photo below. I became interested in the narrative painted by the footprints and marks in the sand and the people in the background. Who did the footprints belong to? What were they talking about? Was it families? Was it new lovers? Was it couples on the verge of splitting? Was it old friends? Were people running, jumping? Where were they going? How far would they walk?
