MP Post: Summary

Part One: The Story and the Archive

While I was looking through some of my favorite blog posts, Cbartistry.net I came across a photo of four young girl’s sitting on a living room couch. There could be hundreds, or thousands of photos of a similar setting but what caught my attention was the clothing, jewelry, and facial expression of each child. That’s when I thought back to some of the photos that I owned back in my family photo album.

“Archiving family photos used to mean simply sticking them in a hard-backed album.”(Michael Hewitt)

To make my story seem a bit odd and different, I decided to not let people know that I did not know who the young girl’s were in the photo. Instead, I would want to reach out to the each one to find out more about the photo, because there were so many comparisons.  My archive are the actual photos taken on the day, and I have remade the original photos of myself and my sister. I also brought in a package that was “sent” to me from one of the 4 girl’s who has a copy of the photo. I took photos of a “living room” scene from which the photos were taken on a wall, and desk. I bought frames to put the photographs inside and set up curtains in the background to show that the photos were actually from her house. The two girls in the photo are looking away at the camera, and when I asked who they could possibly be looking at I got different answers from everyone.

I returned home and found some of my own photos that I could bring in to show that I dressed similar and wore the same jewelry too. I had so many photos, so I decided to choose the one of my sister and I, and one of my sister.

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Using the photo’s that Cidgy provided from the package I inserted all of the photos inside of the frames, and took photographs.

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Part Two: Starting From a Research Based Project

A research based practice is one that we have visited and looked at in class, which is the Walid Ra’ad exhibit, and Zoe Beloff. Both artists took two events, or interests and used several ways to make their work become an actual project.

I used my research and fabrication of archives to add credence to my story by filling the gaps of the mysterious look that the two girl’s were looking at. I also know the actual story because I have the interview to go back on and fabricate. Also, I have the actual photos and I have fabricated the real ones.

Part Three: Process

I lied about not knowing my four cousin’s, how I contacted each person, how the photographs were sent to me, the mystery behind the bracelet and the focus that brought the two girl’s away from the camera, and the day the photo was taken. I actually know my cousin’s very well. I made the initial discovery when I was going through one of my favorite blog websites one day. Which is actually called, www.cbartistry.net. Originally, I said that I made a phone call to each person, which I did but it was because I had all of their numbers. What I had to do was go through Cidgy’s website and fill out her contact form to get into contact with her and she gave me the number to reach out to everyone, and I did an over the phone interview.

“I’ve always been a cheesy person as a child and even now that’s just my personality I’m always a happy person. I always tell people that I have one emotion and that is to be cheesy and happy all the time. That’s the only emotion really that I have control over”(Sewicka Bien- Aime).

As soon as I knew that I wanted to work with this photograph I saved the file to my computer, and I went into Walgreen’s with the photo on a flash drive. I printed my photos from the photo center and had frames previously. The package that was “sent” to me was a package that my mom sent to me last month, that had my address and name to look like I had received a package. The mystery behind the bracelet and the focus of the two young girl’s is going to be solved in the future. That’s when I plan my Thanksgiving trip to Boston to spend time with the four girl’s and see how they have grown up, and find the truth about the mystery person. The photo was actually taken on Sunday after church, and I lied and said that the photo was taken on Thanksgiving Day 1999.

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Bibliography

“EMILY STEIN.” EMILY STEIN. Accessed December 10, 2015. http://www.emilystein.co.uk.

Accessed December 10, 2015. http://www.theguardian.com/childrens-books-site/2015/oct/13/mary-hoffman-amazing-grace-25-years-diversity.

Accessed December 09, 2015. http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2011/mar/05/family-photographs-history.

 

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