Ellen Ringstad. 2009. The end is the beginning is the end, Image V-15. Sculptural Photography.
I guess you can say that I have taken a radical turn since my last post. Be warned that the images can be perceived as disturbing.
Susa encouraged me to experiment and approach the subject a bit differently than I was used to, while staying true to the words I had chosen (materiality, transparency, cutting, constructing).
Materiality in architecture “is the concept of, or applied use of, various materials or substances in the medium of building.” Materials can be either virtual, physical or a combination of the two. An example of this can be certain veneers (printed plastic). As a postulate, virtual materials in architecture cannot exist without a physical substrate. (1)
Materials are tactile, they appeal to the sense of touch, but their surface may be representational; a photograph printed on paper, then, can be both. What interests me is how a photograph can be used as a material to physically describe its own content. My approach from now on is to find a relationship between content and form.
Above: Image IV-41.
Since the hand is the ultimate tool for constructing as well as the most obvious symbol of tactility, I thought it would be interesting to use it as a primary motive.
I went on experimenting with different materials, both organic and synthetic, while photographing the whole process. I chose to work with: hands, latex gloves, Jell-O, opaque plastic sheet, and later on: the printed photographs of the process itself.
From Avove: Image III-10, IV-30 and IV-7
I liked these materials for their range of associations and contradictions. The hand is versatile and expressive; it can touch, be touched; used as a means of non-verbal communication (gesticulation); construct or destruct; be active or passive, aggressive or defensive. Latex gloves are used in medical examination (i.e. birth; illness) or forensic pathology; it is a symbol of life, decay and death. Latex, a natural material, is the most common used material in condoms, a reference to carnal pleasures. The red Jell-O gives associations both to food and bodily fluids. Interestingly Jello-O is the generic term for gelatine desserts and gelatine is made of collagen from animal’s skin and bones. The opaque plastic sheet and the gloves (in surgery) ensures sterile conditions (asepsis) in order to prevent infections. Paper is an organic material and also the traditional material for printing images and text. It is usually a flat representation of something non-flat. It appeals to the mind only through the sense of sight – eliminating information such as sound, touch, smell, taste and time; it can depict gruesome narratives in a distant, sterile environment.
From Avove: Image III-61, III-62 and III-28
I wanted to recreate the intensity of the images through photography, sculpturally modifying the image according to its content. The virtual image becomes a physical substrate thereby reducing the distance created by a flat photography.
From Avove: Image IV-52, IV-56, IV-62, and IV-66
I also wanted to maintain the sense of time by documenting the whole process, and using the documentation itself as a material in a never-ending prosess in which the hand destroys the representation of itself; then the representation of the representation, etc; Destructing, constructing, destructing again; A cycle of life and death.
Somehow this reminded me of a beautiful song by the Smashing Pumpkins, called “The End is the Beginning is the End” which will also be my working title.
The sewers belch me up
The heavens spit me out
From ethers tragic
I am born again
And now I'm with you now
Inside your world of wow
To move in desires made of deadly pretends
Till the end times begin
Is it bright where you are
Have the people changed
Does it make you happy
you're so strange
And in your darkest hour, I hold secrets flame
You can watch the world devoured in it's pain
Strange
Climb my ribcage to
The replays run for you
Unhook my lights to peek behind the flash
For I am crystal chrome
I am shatter dome
I am kremlin king of angels avenged
To destroy the end
Is it bright where you are
Have the people changed
Does it make you happy you're so strange
And in your darkest hour, I hold secrets flame
You can watch the world devoured in it's pain
The zeppelins rain upon us
The guns of love disastrous
A shadow lies amongst you
To defy the future cast
Is it bright where you are
Have the people changed
Does it make you happy you're so strange
And in your darkest hour, I hold secrets flame
You can watch the world devoured in it's pain
Strange
Strange
/
Send a heartbeat to
The void that cries through you
Relive the pictures that have come to pass
For now we stand alone
The world is lost and blown
And we are flesh and blood disintegrate
With no more to hate
Is it bright where you are
And have the people changed
Does it make you happy you're so strange
And in your darkest hour
My old secrets laid
We can watch the world devoured in its pain
Delivered from the blast
The last of a line of lasts
The pale princess of a palace cracked
And now the kingdom comes
Crashing down undone
And I am a master of a nothing place
Of recoil and grace
Is it bright where you are
And have the people changed
Does it make you happy you're so strange
And in your darkest hour I hold secrets flame
We can watch the world devoured in its pain
Time has stopped before us
The sky cannot ignore us
No one can separate us
For we are all that is left
The echo bounces off me
The shadow lost beside me
There's no more need to pretend
Cause now I can begin again
Is it bright where you are
And have the people changed
Does it make you happy you're so strange
And in your darkest hour my old secrets laid
We can watch the world devoured in its hate
Strange
Strange
Strange
From Avove: Image IV-74, IV-72, IV-71 and V-15.
It is surprising that each step in this process actually makes the experience stronger and more violent, the paper becomes "fleshy" even though there is and increasing distance from the original materials - as if violence only breads more violence.
The obvious reference to violence and sexualized violence will be my thematic approach when attempting to construct an installation - that is, my version of “Neverland”.
To be continued…
