To link to my research project, I would be keen to run a workshop about creating work within the community. This could potentially be about how to approach people and places within the community and identify the cultural signifiers that make that place unique and why you are drawn to it – the reason why you want to take the images in the first place.
I am still getting to grips with grounding my project in this area, so I think the workshop would be just as important for me as it would be the participants. Especially. Plus, if the participants were also from the same community that I am making my work it would create valuable insight into how others perceive the same place, which I also live.
My workshop would comprise of peer discussion and Q&A to establish prior knowledge, understanding of socially engaged photography, and provide me with an opportunity to outline any learning outcomes and introductions. The workshop should take a day to complete, including practical time to go out and start to create images with the potential for a later plenary, or online presentation of work once participants have had the opportunity to create imagery.
The Creative Hub by the Printspace put together a really useful guide in the different ways to show and promote work (2020). I am going to attempt to analyse these approaches compared to what I have already done and what I could to towards them. My notes are numbered in red.
Budget of £0 – £250
Instagram1
Website2
Magazine/Blog Feature3
Cost:
£0
£120- £250 per year (if using a template)
£0
Time to Launch:
1 week
1 month
Depends on publisher
Post Launch:
7 – 20 hours per week
4 hours per week
Dependent on the reach of the feature
Getting Noticed:
Make interesting content and engage with other users, which will organically build your following
Improve SEO blogging and regularly refreshing content. Link to your site from all from all social accounts
Share/Publish the feature on all your social media accounts
Key Tasks:
– Making interesting & original content – Post scheduling – Engagement with other users
– Domain registration – Logo & corporate identity design – Choosing & adapting site template – Set meta tags & meta descriptions for pages -Choose SEO friendly URLs
– Find publications that suit your work – Create press package, email, supply images in correct format – Ensure your website is working for when people click through
Figure 1: Creative Hub (2020) Table showing different methods of showing work with a budget of £0 – £250
Instagram: Having run an instagram account for quite a few years, I find it quite challenging to maintain the level of consistency and sustained approach to sharing and commenting. I understand that this is important and do maintain my presence on the platform
I have found that when i was freelancing that platforms, such as Linkedin are far more valuable for building a focussed interest in my work as i am sharing it with professionals who have a vested interest in seeing what I can do
That being said, Instagram feels much more accessible and is an important part of getting my work in front of audiences
Website: My website is a self hosted WordPress site after many years of running template sites, I actually enjoy the flexibility of WordPress. However, consistency in the presentation, although might be considered dull and formulaic, is useful for clients and editors who would easily navigate the work knowing the formula of Squarespace et al.
Maintaining my website in this way is flexible but also much more cost effective than using a template site. My running cost for my own site is roughly a third of what Creative hub is suggesting. Not including the recent update to my website that included a custom theme, which was the first time that I invested in a premium version.
The downside of running this myself is that I must invest much more time in the setting up and really research SEO techniques (which I still have much to do).
Blogs/Magazines: In addition to the promotional side of sending work to be shared and reviewed. I am also keen to pitch my work for syndication and publication, which would also mean payment to me. This of course, is how I would operate as an editorial freelance. That said, there is an expectation that I would need to share work for free in certain circles in order to generate the interest required for paid opportunity.
In order to make my work more valuable to publishers it is also worth creating written work in support of my photography.
Also worth considering any secondary markets for the work to make it as accessible as possible outside the usual photographic channels.
Budget of £250 – £1,250
Printed Portfolio4
Zine5
Group Exhibition6
Cost:
£300 – 700
£500 – 1,250
£250 – 1,000
Time to Launch:
2 – 4 weeks
3 – 6 months
2 – 4 months
Post Launch:
2 – 4 hours per week
4 – 6 hours per week
10 – 15 hours per week during show. 5 – 10 hours following up interest after
Getting Noticed:
Attending portfolio reviews & festivals. Meetings with agents/ art buyers/creative directors/marketing/creative agencies
Having a launch. Selling online & getting reviewed blogs/magazines
Promoting the event extensively across social media, press reach-outs, emailing invites, posting out printed invites
Key Tasks:
– Confirm edit – Print test strips – Choose paper – Choose presentation method – Arrange reviews/meetings
– Confirm edit – Write copy – Research print/bind methods – Design layout – Print/bind final version
– Space hire – Curate/install – Private view/refreshments – PR: marketing/press/social media
Figure 2: Creative Hub (2020) Table showing different methods of showing work with a budget of £250 – £1,250
Printed Portfolio: I am thinking at this stage of the MA, that I am not in a position to have a completed printed portfolio. I am a proponent of a well presented printed portfolio and am keen to pursue this in the future for the FMP.
I already own a box for presenting prints, for example (Fig: 1). The argument for allowing readers to construct their own narratives from my work supports this method of printing and presenting work. They are also useful to spread prints out and see how they might work together – An important consideration for clients.
I also have a courier case, which is useful to protect the box and send it out to potential clients. This might include: publishers, galleries and other potential audiences for my work without necessarily having to spend the time travelling around myself. The more traditional method of getting work out there.
Portfolio reviews can be quite costly and it is really important to only attend those that represent value for money. Better value would be to really research potential clients and buyers of my work and set up meeting with those people instead.
A downside of this method is the need to replace prints as they are frequently handled, which would be a concern of a blurb style book and folder style folio, however print sleeves might circumvent this.
In terms of what might represent the most value for money in presenting work, this might be the best in time and money spent, over a book dummy for example. it also allows others to see sequences in the work that will work for them.
What could be quite useful about zines is the ability to make a self published object that I can then sell myself. The main challenges is the initial outlay of this can be quite costly, especially when I do not have the £500 stated by Creativehub above.
To truly make a success of self published zines, it would be useful to already have an established audience, which is where platforms like Instagram would be useful.
For Landings, I have produced a short run of 20 zines (the minimum required by The Newspaper Club for printing).
Even if I do not manage to sell any copies of my zine, they can become a useful promotional tool to send out to potential audiences of my work.
Group Exhibition: Not something that I have lots of experience with outside of an academic setting. That said, the Landings 2020 experience will be useful to understand the process and potentially see how disparate bodies of work can be curated together.
Additionally, all of the work that I am carrying out towards the creation of my own zines and website updates will support creating promotional material for group shows in the future.
Figure 1: Seawhite (2020) Archival print box
Budget of £1,250 +
Solo Exhibition. 7
Art Fair. 8
Book. 9
Cost:
£1000 – 7000
£3,500
£5000+
Time to Launch:
3 – 6 months
1 – 3 months
6 – 12 months
Post Launch:
40 – 60 hours per week during show, 20 hours following up interest after
12 hours a day during the show, 20 hours following up interest after
8 – 20 hours per week
Getting Noticed:
By promoting the event extensively across social media, press reach out and direct email
Good presentation, understanding the type of attendees to the fair, following up diligently on interest
Having a launch, finding stockists, entering book awards, attending publishing fairs, selling online, getting reviews
Key Tasks:
– Space hire – Curate/Install – Private view/refreshments -PR: marketing/press/social media – Create show catalogue – Set up print sales; online and in the space
– Design & curate the space – Create catalogue and takeaways for attendees (e.g. postcards) – Setting up digital capture of details – Set up point of sale terminals
– Create edit, produce dummy – Get text written – Review/critique – Final edit – Research printing techniques – Design – Promotion
Figure 3: Creative Hub (2020) Table showing different methods of showing work with a budget of £1,250+
This block is potentially a bit beyond me at the moment due to financial and where a solid audience will need to be created in order to justify some of these.
Solo Show: There are opportunities to exhibit work in venues that do not cost as much as this, or would even be free for a percentage of any sales. The compromise would potentially be in the location of such venues however.
promotion would inevitably still cost money to produce the materials necessary.
Many of the options that have been outlined above might also need to be put in place before I am in a position to be able to put on a solo show.
Art Fair: This is another one that I am fairly new to. It could present a good opportunity to build an audience for my work if the right fair was selected. Quite risky with the budget that CreativeHub suggests.
Book: Book publishing is an interesting one. As I understand it, if you even manage to secure the interest of a publisher, you might still have to put together a substantial investment of money in order to realise the book.
There are a number of dummy book awards and Mack’s for example is free to enter.
As I work for an FE college, there are a good amount of facilities to help me realise a book dummy should I wish to pursue that in order to keep the costs down
Sequencing is vital for the success of the book as it could be easily overlooked.
Bibliography
Creative Hub, 2020. How to Show your Work. London: Printspace Studios Limited.
I have been spending time considering the photograph as an object related to my research around Object Orientated Ontology, black and white images and a documentary aesthetic. Source magazine also have a writing prize, so I have put together a short article about the topic as i feel this would be a good way to explore ideas and also use writing as a process to present them:
Drawing Attention to the Photograph
Robert Frank (1955) Elevator, Miami Beach – From ‘The Americans”
When Robert Frank penned his application to the Guggenheim foundation leading to the hugely influential ‘The Americans’ trip, he wanted: “To produce an authentic contemporary document, the visual impact should be such as will nullify explanation” (Frank, 2012). This accomplishment was never in dispute. However, he also did something else: Frank showed the US photographed and by doing so, drew attention to the act of photography in challenging the stiff, formal technical proficiency of traditionalists such as Henri Cartier-Bresson and his mentor, Walker Evans (O’Hagan, 2014). Frank broke all the rules with his approach to process, As John Szarkowski points out: “what was being described had to be described because it was there, it didn’t have to be described according to the rules and formulations that were thought of as being good photography” (2013). Frank’s photographs openly display the act of photography by showing you the means of its production (showing you the strings): motion blur, un-level horizons, moving the depth of field from the main subject of the image, shifting attention. Things that are only shown through photographs, and considered mistakes by some, yet they cut through the illusion of perfection, making them relatable and placing Frank into the photograph as the photographer.
This idea of drawing attention to the photographic act might sound pretty obvious to anyone looking at Frank’s photographs, now part of the mythology of a documentary aesthetic: black and white inviting the reader to view the subject nostalgically, for example. These quintessential qualities of the photograph are opposed to the way that we interpret the world and a learned knowledge of their perceived importance, as Vilém Flusser notes: “Many photographers … prefer black-and-white photographs to colour photographs because they more clearly reveal the actual significance of the photograph, i.e. the world of concepts” (2000, p. 43). Of course, for Frank, black and white film was the primary means to photograph, yet it still highlights a contrast of the real world. Contemporary photographers such as Vanessa Winship, choose to utilise this conceptual suggestive power of black and white, clearly recognising the subjective act of photography, or as she puts it best, the area “between chronicle and fiction” (Winship, 2015), drawing attention to her photographs’ contrast of the concrete world and as objects in themselves.
Drawing attention to the act of photography separates it from the sea of images occupying our daily lives, perhaps one of the last bastions of differentiation that the photographer has. It is easy to take a picture, everyone has the means to do it, but the awareness of the photograph as an object remains with those willing to study it and then accentuate its qualities, both conceptual and technical. Photographers do this often with apparatus. For example, Joel Mereowitz considers the theatre of the 10×8 camera in which he captured Provincetown a significant part of that work, where even during the late 70’s and early 80’s must have seemed like apparatus from a distant time (Meyerowitz in Perello, 2020). This idea also led to Alys Tomlinson making a ‘break through’ in pursuit of her seminal project ‘Ex-Voto’ when she switched to large format black and white (Tomlinson in Smith, 2020).
The theatre of apparatus also draws attention to the photographic act, though not necessarily for the viewer. It is more of an interaction between the author and subject as it creates the means to interject the visual associations of candid and vernacular; apparatus invites intrigue, breaking down tension with a curious subject. It should be noted, this reaction may not have happened without its presence bringing up questions of subjectivity and representation as it is more an intervention by the photographer author, as Philip Toledano reminds us, “The art is always about you [the photographer] in some respect, it’s just a question of how visible you are in that photograph; how much you can see yourself or other people can see you” (Toledano, 2020). In our world of images, how does the photographer differentiate themselves from the vernacular and the sea of images? Going back to the example of Robert Frank, who’s subject was the vernacular – you draw attention to the photography within the photograph.
Bibliography
Flusser, V., 2000. Towards a Philosophy of Photography. 2018 reprint ed. London: Reaktion Books Ltd.
Frank, R., 2012. A Statement by Robert Frank (1958). [Online] Available at: https://americansuburbx.com/2012/07/robert-frank-a-statement-1958.html [Accessed 15 July 2020].
Meyerowitz, J., 2020. The Candid Frame #500 – Joel Meyerowitz [Interview] (26 January 2020).
O’Hagan, S., 2014. Robert Frank at 90: the photographer who revealed America won’t look back. [Online] Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2014/nov/07/robert-frank-americans-photography-influence-shadows [Accessed 16 July 2020].
Szarkowski, J., 2013. John Szarkowski On Robert Frank’s Book ‘The Americans’” (1986). [Online] Available at: https://americansuburbx.com/2013/05/john-szarkowski-on-robert-franks-book-the-americans-1986.html [Accessed 16 July 2020].
Toledano, P., 2020. A Small Voice: Conversations with Photographers – 132 Phillip Toledano [Interview] (10 June 2020).
Tomlinson, A., 2020. A Small Voice: Conversations with photographers – 123 – Alys Tomlinson [Interview] (5 February 2020).
Winship, V., 2015. A Small Voice: Conversations with Photographers – 003 Vanessa Winship [Interview] (11 November 2015).
Figure 1: Phil Hill (July, 2020) Selection of the images produced during the MA so far.
My project has taken a number of turns throughout the three modules and now for this one I have decided to explore black and white film photography, which creates a big departure from the way that I was photographing my project up until now. This development is how I am starting to move away from a more commercial way of shooting, linked to my comfort zones.
Sequencing is one of my biggest challenges and although I have been putting together a zine in time for Landings, I have not yet started to look at how my work will be edited ready for the next WIPP submission.
Considering formats for publication, I have always quite like the idea of postcard sets as they acknowledge how a reader of the work might create their own narrative from the work. They are quite nice to spread out and do the same as this task. The downside is that the standard postcard is small compared with many books and the quality of the image may be lost in this small format.
I am interested in books as they create a tangible object from the photographed and can be carefully sequenced in a way that the author intended, should that be a primary concern for the project (as opposed to postcards). The challenge with the book is the limitation this might put on the accessibility of the project. Only available to a few people who can afford it and accessing the creation of such a publication where many publishers expect the photographer to contribute to the cost of producing it.
