Snoopers Paradise 

Looking into waste, i wanted to explore further what waste is which meant looking at its origin. This led me to looking at Objects or belongings and the psychological connection we have with our items and the reasoning for throwing them away. I went into Snoopers Paradise as it is known for its vast selection of items from vintage clothes to animals in jars. I have been in there a few times and have become aware of the large number of old family photos that are up for sale, which i feel really embodies the nature in which throw away even our most sentimental items. The idea that a families holiday photos or school portraits are up for sale for someone else to buy and repurpose and that we can even put a price on someone else belongings.

This led to the further exploration of this idea, and looking at artists below:

Paula Morales

This work is a collaboration between Paula Morales, Gutta Galli, and Anita Giasante which looks at found objects and their continuous projection of human life even after death. I found this work interesting as it reflecting a persons personality through an inanimate item which allows for strangers to come and interpret this from their perspective.

Guy Batey 

This series of images by Guy Batey titled ‘ The Melancholy of Objects’ is a display of object Batey came across throughout living in east London. These images are of objects that have been discarded or forgotten about and Batey describes how ‘Some of these objects stop me in my tracks with the power of their presence. They seem to want to talk to me, to tell me their stories. These photographs show what I feel they have to say.’

This concept was interesting to me as it conveyed the idea of how a object that has come to the end of its use, looking broken and destroyed, is able to explore the entirety of its lifecycle, portrayed in its natural form which identifies how although its initial ability for purpose has ended, its still ives through it current state.

The format in which Batey has taken his images is similar to photographers mentioned in previous posts, which

I experimented with digital photography, using my phone to create some low quality high focused images, which i experimented with layout and distortion using photoshop. These images follow on from waste in food and objects, looking at the ease in discarding objects with emotional detachment.

Using magazines and other images, i created collages that reflected waste and sustainability where i then edited them further using photoshop to create a more dynamic image.

Using photoshop, i followed on from the distortion of the images previously, by changing the format of these images using colour and movement to make dynamic GIFS that reflect how waste is manipulated from its original form to being repurposed.

I wanted to document my personal experience with waste using different medias. I used a 35mm point and shoot camera to document my findings as i like the visual ethic of the images. With this series, the images came out good with the colours of the subject of the mage coming out vibrant with a softer background. Through this experimentation i have found that i want to carry this further, experimenting with portrait images and similar as i feel this represents my desire to create a personal documentation of waste in my magazine.

Maisie Cousins 

William Farr

Vilde Rolfsen

I decided to look at artists that manipulated waste into new art pieces. Maisie Cousins is a British artist who uses food waste to create vulgar, but beautifully engaging imagery, incorporating colour and texture with strong stylisation. William Farr is an artist that creates consumer waste into large sculptures, with his most recent work featuring in Selfridges window displays . Much like Maisie Cousins, Farrs work is chaotic with a contrasting minimalism that runs throughout with the main body of his work. The accent of colour and the combination of man made and natural objects work well with conveying a strong tactility within his work. Vilde Rolfsen uses plastic bags to make etherial scenes, using external lighting and colour.

Keith Arnatt is a British artist who, like the previous two artists, has documented waste and rubbish from personal experience/ visiting rubbish dumps. Arnatt’s series of images titled ‘Rubbish Tip 1988-9’ were taken using plastic sheeting and plastic bags as the backdrop with selected objects as the focus, giving a more stylised approach to the series. The plastic sheeting was used to support the lighting of each images dimming the natural light creating a faded effect that accentuated the bright colourings of each focus object. 

The composition of each image is slightly different to show the purity of the subject however was stylised using the sheets of plastic to ensure there is consistency. Similar to Chris Jordan, Arnatt considered aspects like affecting the lighting to make his images unrecognisable; making the viewer completely engage with his work. As Rubbish Tip was released in 1988, the format of his imagery is film, which provides the series with a more dynamic silhouette. With digital camera creating more vivid colours like in Harley Weird work, the film creates a more muted image which I think works well. Using film to convey sustainability and waste in today’s society would allow the strong social identifiers to be the focal point for the imagery with the film contrasting this.