My project is focused on out of place objects within everyday areas, which have been residential so far. It's difficult to define what is an out of place object, but basically man- made objects/ imprints that have been left which are not in places that they should be. These things are then meant to make the viewer think about how/ why they were left in such a way, giving the photograph past narrative which is invented by the viewer. For this project I'm just focusing on narrative of the past, instead of what might happen to the object in the future.
Narrative is something very important in photography, because in telling visual stories about the world, photography is essentially narrating the world. Narrative is intrinsically linked to social communication for the passing of information and has been used for thousands of years to do this. A different narrative can be created by everyone, because we all have a different background which when given a visual stimulus will create a different story to the scene shown. This is because the visual stimulus makes the viewer recount their memory to connect their individual past encounters, in a way of attaching connotation on why/how that object has been left in the way it has. Because the viewer is not given any other information apart from the photograph, they have to use their own memory to create the story for what happened to create the scene captured.
'In photography, narrative is related to the idea of context. No matter how complete or comprehensive a narrative appears it will always be the product of including some elements and excluding others. Inclusion/ exclusion is part of what construction is all about, but knowing what is best included or excluded requires an understanding of context. And an understanding of context requires visual storytellers to be highly proficient researchers.'
This quote is relevant to my work but connects better to those photographers who are telling a the story of a journey, like in a photo book or something. Whereas my work only looks at the past bit of the story, with what has happened to that scene up to the point of taking the photograph, without looking to the future.
My project relates to and represents the left items found in everyday residential areas, which I have then documented through the median of photography. The photographs are then viewed and narratives are created by those viewers for how/ why they were left in such a way. These objects/ scenes can then be looked at in a way to understand the dynamics of the area I'm looking at. The narratives/ thoughts the viewer creates for the individual photographs result in them creating their own impression on the area. This impression will be opinionated though because they only see what I show.