Honorable Mention
#280_Impotent
DESCRIPTION
As humans, we are not fixed, we change throughout our lives but sometimes it takes time to realise what those changes are, to understand who we are now, not who we were: It can be easy to ignore those voices. Making these images helped me to reconnect with my own internal consciousness, and to express those emotions and thoughts that are so often internalised and repressed, to help navigate and understand these changes.In becoming subject as well as the artist, the images create a dynamic that opens a dialogue with the observer. The moment of making each image can become a total immersion into my own thoughts and feelings, but the act of having to take the photograph at the same time can allow the unconscious to rise to the surface and express multiple messages in that moment. This type of image making becomes a sort of performance; a performance which is a collaboration between my mind and my body.
The relationship we have with ourselves is often one that we ignore.
AUTHOR
Claire French is a British artist based in Manchester and has recently completed her MfA in photography, at the Belfast School of Art, University of Ulster. Initially studying English Literature at university, she went on to find her true creative passion in photography, whilst taking her enthusiasm for stories and narratives with her. She has also spent some time studying psychology, fuelling her fascination in people and how they think, interact, connect and navigate their way through life.
Her practice often begins in a deeply personal space, fluidly and experimentally, often drawing inspiration from literature and poetry. Her work is often, in its first instance, autobiographical, telling intimate stories whilst drawing on their universality and a shared collective memory allowing others the opportunity to connect with their own stories with a sense of recognition and catharsis
She focuses on personal histories and how we build stories around our own inner psyche versa, with a focus on relationships, time, memory, transitions and identity, using a variety of photographic approaches including working with re-photography and archival images.
