This exhibition was very moving and had some very interesting bodies of work. Some more interesting than others, but most of them have inspired me in different ways to create work of my own.
I found this body of work to be very moving and interesting, how the photographer, Heather Agyeong, uses her practice to as a form of self care by imagining the activities the oppressors of slavery would have done. I really visually enjoyed this work and how beautifully presented it is.
I really love how she has put the work together, using the same position but with the red thread, I feel it makes the work come across as very powerful and gives off a strong message to the viewers. I really connected with this work due to my own condition (Fibromyalgia) and it has really inspired me to create a project based on my struggles with it.
Again, I struggled to connect with this work by Rosy Martin, I found the photos to be quite aesthetically pleasing however I am not too sure I full understand her concept behind it, I find it to be a bit boring and confusing. I understand the meaning behind why she has dressed this way, but I just feel it is not to my taste.
The questions however really got me thinking.
How are you silencing yourself?
What would it be like to speak your truths and who needs to hear?
I could write an essay about these two questions and how they make me feel, however I feel this may not be the place to do so, I also do not think I am quite ready to speak my truths out loud just yet as I fear people would just not understand them and would silence me even more.
I found this work to be the most moving from the exhibition as I feel it relates to a lot of current events and how women can be treated by men. To see the faces and how different they all are really goes to show that a lot of men really do not go for a certain ‘type’ or go for them because they are wearing provocative clothes and ‘asking for it’, even though this is in no way a permission slip to allowing men to oppress and abuse women. The way this piece of work was executed made me feel really touched and quite scared, having the statements from the people and then the faces next to them to see how they look is a really powerful way of exhibiting the work. And really seeing how different each girl is.
As I said before, being able to go to an exhibition in real life after not being able to for so long was so incredibly nice and powerful and made me remember just how much of an impact they can have and the inspiration they bring to me for my own practice. I also felt inspired by the way the exhibition was put together, the different layouts and how some of the images were shown has really helped me to move forward and get some of my own ideas.