28 juillet au 4 aout 2019
• https://openworld.photography•
Mike Stephens, Marc Provins & Michael McGinley.
As our human made world becomes more complex and we develop technologies unimaginable to previous generations, we seem increasingly detached from the rest of nature. This has consequences for our environment and landscape. Open World endeavours to investigate this process through image making. The work is concerned with the condition of our surroundings, in particular those hinterlands where the constructed, organic and virtual meet. We ask how lens- based media can be used in new ways as an effective means of enquiry and documentation?
The research centres on contemporary landscape imaging whilst experimenting with the conventions of photography and developing robust approaches to collaborative work. The project was established after discovering an overlap of conceptual starting points, working methods and aesthetic values in our three individual practices. The focus of this project is to investigate and record ‘liminal vestigial zones’ where the constructed, organic and virtual meet in the contemporary landscape.
The project is born of a joint fascination with the space around us, whether this be through the relationship between nature and manufacture, chance and design or process and device. This venture uses photographic practice to undertake a field survey but is not simply concerned with data collection. Recognising and engaging with the inexorable cultural movement towards complexity, this body of work exploits the value of the slow and intuitive gaze as a creative research method to contribute to the discourse around contemporary landscape imaging.
