Project discussion

Project discussion - Letch

By way of introduction and as an example of my current reset, I’m going to use the opportunity of this opening paragraph to explain some of the ideas behind Urgent Temporality. I set this identity up to give a name to my developing research/art practice in response to how I saw the still image developing contemporarily. The use of the camera and the resulting images adding into the flow of imagery in this digitally connected society has caused many questions, some of which I hope to explore through the UT practice. As part of this I’m developing thoughtful researched photographic projects to exemplify ideas of Urgent Temporality. This blog will be used to discuss projects, ideas and thoughts, as time constraints apply the posts are fundamentally set up as 150-word pieces (150 being the suggested word count for the length of an introduction for a PhD proposal, as an outline to the idea, as set out by various institutions.)

Occasionally I will put in a post that fits under a ‘longer read’ exploring a subject that may have the potential to develop into a body of work and/or into an academic paper format. I believe that these all fit under the exploration of ideas that constitute urgent temporality and the inspection of the role of the still image in contemporary society. This is the first published example of the longer read format and will attempt to further discuss an idea for an individual project idea and it’s problems with development.

The proposed project.

The basis for this photographic project is revisiting/recollecting the spirits of my early teachings of how to make work, where I was repeatedly given advice of  

‘photograph what you love’,

With the applications of my new practice which is examining the ideas surrounding the photography process and it’s disruption, I’m subverting this previously given advice and to alternate these previous teachings, in this case I’m aiming to photograph what I hate. One of my most longstanding hates is that of toxicity of masculinity, currently I’m observing forms of this unconstructed male gaze, especially towards women, a term commonly known as ‘Letching’

I stated out by trying to capture these ‘looks’ that men gave when they feel they aren’t being critically observed. It has long been a factor of men in groups to ogle, letch, and subjecting females to this horrible objectifying gaze but increasingly I’ve noticed single males committing this practice. I have been trying to capture it and have been successful in getting a few images, but they lacked the completion of showing in a single image how repulsive this practice is and in turn the repulsion I felt to this part of toxic masculinity.

Then as I walked down one of the main streets in this city, I saw the ideal ‘street’ type image that would capture the absolute disgust of this practice. Here is an explanation of the scene’s constituent parts:

The first is of a woman who looked like she was either going/coming from the gym, wearing suitable attire for that activity, was waiting to cross the road, I was on the other side of the road.

A worker’s van with a large male inside had crossed the stop line considerably over the line, in an effort to turn right and beat the lights but the lights had changed to red, so he had to wait for the pedestrians to cross the road but his encroachment onto the path of the pedestrian crossing put him much closer than is allowed.

As this woman crossed, his gaze fixated on her with such a repugnant look, one that you could read with absolutely no doubt and given with such entitlement to the viewing of her body. I was appalled at this site, but the combination of this scene brought everything together for the intention of this project.

I started to raise my camera to capture this scene, when I caught the look of the person crossing and in that moment the disgust was apparent, they’d not seen the large male in the van, but they did see the male with the camera raising it to take a picture containing her presence within it.

I immediately put the camera down without making a successful image.

I have reflected on this as my old practice would have been to take the image and be dammed but my new practice is much more refined and taking into account aspects of: Involvement, socially engaged practices, representation, thoughts of take/make imagery, increased reflection on the process answering the ‘why’ of the image. So I now ask:

Am I right, am I wrong?

That’s not easy to answer.

It raises further questions

The first is by the act of observing and attempting to make these images do I run the risk as being perceived as one of these letches except this time with a camera, in my experience this a term rightly applied to a lot of photographers.

Could I be more identifiable with the letch that someone who is opposed to it?

In other words, have I become as bad as the letch? Have I become that which I hate?

Thoughts on how to change, advance this project have consisted of the use of a model who has full knowledge of what, and how, the images are being made and with their full cooperation. There are a number of possible problems that arise from this approach. Starting from a traditional standpoint of the ethics/morals/creative aspects of the (re)creation of images in this way. You are constructing rather than discovering the image. You have distinctively applied yourself onto the scene. If through this approach the presences of the camera invited men to further ogle more freely in the scene, would their defence then be of entrapment into the scenario? Would the act of doing this, falsify the evidence of the image?

The next vital question is the purpose of this project and if I am the right person to do this work?

I have been reflecting on this in pedagogical terms recently, as well as applying equality theories and examining the ‘great white hunter’ model of previous photography practices.

Would a female perspective on this apply better to the outcomes of the project?

Should I be doing this work?

Does it hold any value?

I believe to answer that I need further input from various people in order to make any advancements with this project. This process of reflection, questioning all may become something to draw upon in my urgent temporality practice.

The next and last far-reaching question that can be applied to this piece and all work would be:

‘Why am I doing this work?’

What is the point of adding yet another set of images into the flow, will they get lost in the stream, what is the point of creating anything these days while the world burns both physically and conceptually what is the point in adding to the banality of the image? I realise there is no easy answer to this and it’s something for philosophical debate, that will possibly never arrive at a fulfilling answer. It could lead to a statement about the three roles of the path of research and education and creation is to reveal what is hidden and not what is lost.

Thank you for reading, any comments, thoughts or ideas then please get me through the websites or social media platforms.

Further Notes:

I always try to make my language gender neutral but in this case I feel the using of male, woman and female are pertinent to the story and would not exhibit my point if gender neutral terms are applied. Welcome any thoughts on this.

An interesting side avenue appears here with my recollection of an image seen possibly in the 90’s that I cannot identify wholeheartedly with a short application of applicable search terms for the internet.

It stems from my memory of an image that I cannot find in the current structures of image searches i.e Google…which I believe I will expand on in another writing.