Commission Unit – Environment Part 1 and Critical Appraisal

8/13/2019 Commission Unit Environment Part 1 and Critical Appraisal

1/22

COMMISSION UNIT ENVIRONMENT PART 1RECLAIMED BY NATURE ZOE COOMBES


2/22

INTRODUCTION

For my environment assignment I decided to look at areas that have been left derelict byhumans because of either unseen events or because humans have deemed the area not usefulanymore.

The main reasons why I decided to look at this subject is because of the well-known problem ohow much of the environment humans are now destroying for either recourses or places to buildon, when there are so many places around that have been abandoned by humans and sit there

unused for generations.I wanted to photograph what happens to these areas when human activity is no longer presentand nature has had a chance to start reclaiming the area. I want to show that even though somepeople think ourselves the most dominate creatures on the earth and, they think of nature assmall and insignificant, even nature can take what we have made and bypass some of ourstrongest and most commonly used materials, for example concrete.


3/22

Contextual Research Ten Abandoned Places and Why They Were Left Behind


4/22

INITIAL ARTIST RESEARCHJOEL STERNFELD

For my initial artist research I decided to look at Joel Sternfeld. The series I focused on for my researwas the series of the railway lines that sit over areas in New York.

I think these are very good examples for the type of work I work to produce, especially as an example fthe abandoned by humans photograph rather than abandon because of an unseen event.

My favourite out of the series would be Ailanthus Trees, 25 th Street, May 2000 (shown abovthis picture shows nature taking over the frame and almost hiding the buildings and man-made objects ouof your sight.


5/22

Joel Sternfeld


6/22

INITIAL IDEA

- UNSUCCESSFULWESTMOUNT COLLEGE

Westmount College was founded in 1847 as a Jewish School, throughout its lifetime apart from 20 years it has alwaybeen a place of education up until it was closed in the 90s after being a adult education centre run by Dover CouncThere was a fire there in 2007 which completely burnt the roof off of the top floor, it is still derelict today with no planrenovating.

I found a lot of pictures that people managed to take from inside of the building, but all of them where taken bef2010, since then there has been a large metal fence at the front entrance so my next step was to try and get permissionto go onto the land.

I phoned Dover council got put through to a few different departments and had to wait on a few people to phone mback but in the end I got through to someone who told me that they had sold the area to a company in 2007. I emailethe company as well as phoned them and I am still waiting on a reply, so after a few days of no answer I started to loo

into other alternatives.


7/22

All Pictures Were Taken Before 2010

Westmount College


8/22

FURTHER ARTIST RESEARCHMICHAEL DAY

AND CHERNOBYL DISASTER

To carry on from looking at Seinfeld's abandoned railway tracks, I decided to look into places that habeen abandoned because of unseen events. This lead me on to looking at Chernobyl, a very well knowndisaster which left a whole town derelict.

Firstly I looked at people that have gone to Chernobyl and photographed the town of Pripyat. The mperson that I came across was Ric Wrights who created an eBook about Pripyat. This included a largamount of photographs by Michael Day which stood out compared to others in the book.

My favourite picture of Days is of a balcony with a man standing looking out into Chernobyl, tfocus of the picture for me was the tree that is growing out of the concrete on the balcony.


9/22

Michael Day


10/22


11/22


12/22

TEST SHOTS - DIGITALTEST SHOTS IN DOVER

To the right is my contact sheet of my first testshots. I took these in Dover, mainly trying to focuson finding trees or plants growing out of concreteor other man-made materials.

Even though I didnt get many pictures for this testshoot I am happy with how they turned out and Ithink it helped me get more of an idea of what Iwanted my final pictures to turn out like.


13/22


14/22

PLACES FOR FINAL PHOTOGRAPHSFAVERSHAM OLD WATER TOWER AND FAVERSHAM GUNPOWDER MILLS

Because of the college in Dover taking to long to sort out I decided to look for other places to take my finphotographs.

The final places I found where all in Faversham and within an hours walk of each over.

My first and favourite place was the Faversham Gunpowder Mills. This like my Chernobyl research shoan unexpected event causing a once largely used place to become derelict and reclaimed by nature overtime.

My second is an old water mill just outside of Faversham, which like the railway in Seinfeld's work, place that has been seen as unneeded so is left for nature to reclaim.


15/22

PLACES FOR FINAL PHOTOGRAPHSFAVERSHAM GUN POWDER MILLS

The main place I photographed for my final pictures is the Faversham Gun Powder Mill.

The gunpowder mills are located at Uplees, near Faversham, it was the biggest explosive supplier in Kentfor the First World War. In 1916 there was a massive explosion when a store of 200 tons of TNT wasignited when some empty sacks caught fire, killing 115 men and boys (no women were working as it was Sunday) and destroyed most of the buildings and scenery around the area. The explosion was so big thatit is seen as the worst in the history of British explosive industry.


16/22

Final Photographs Contact Sheet Gunpowder Mills and Water Tower


17/22


18/22

Final Prints Water Tower


19/22

Final Prints Reclaimed Bridge (Gun Powder Mill)


20/22

Fi l P i R l i d B ildi (G P d Mill)


21/22

Final Prints Reclaimed Building (Gun Powder Mill)

C iti lA i l


22/22

Critical Appraisal

For the environment unit I decided to look at nature reclaiming areas that humans have destroyed for either resources or space to build The building that most influenced my choice was Westmount College in Dover. The reason for this is because have lived near this buildinof my life and when looking at it, it is a huge example of people seeing a place as not useful anymore so it sits there for years with naslowly taking it back. Even though I think I could have got a few nice pictures of it I am happy that Westmount fell-through, because stage I think I was beginning to focus more on abandoned buildings rather than nature over taking them.

I started doing my research in early October on Joel Sternfeld, the reason why I decided to start my research with Sternfeld is because I hsaw his railway series before and thought the series was a beautiful way to show people a once used area that has been reclaimed by natureIt wasnt until later on in the project that I looked back and realised that the way Sternfeld comprised some of his pictures. For exLooking south on an afternoon in June and Ailanthus trees it looks like nature was either spreading out from the middle or the side, hiding the man-made objects. This can also been seen with some of Burtynskys pictures.

By the 22 nd October I had taken my first digital test shoots, I am happy with how these turned out - my favourite one being the closeplant growing out of the concrete but I think I should have taken more test shots of the gunpowder mill and the watermill.

By 9 th November I had finalized my locations, finished shooting my final pictures, and starting doing test prints. After looking at the

sheet I was happy with my pictures and had picked out one of the water tower and three or four I liked of the gunpowder mills for posfinal prints.

On the 5 th December I printed a total of five images and decided to use four of them for my final prints. I am happy with how they turmy favourite being the broken bridge (where you can see reminisce of wood that families have tried rebuilding the bridge over years) think that it is the best example of nature reclaiming man-made objects again and again. I wasnt sure that the water towfirst pictures as they could give the feeling of being stuck and with nowhere to go so I decided to include also the picturlike the depth of field and the leafs on, the balance out the choice of four.

Over all I am happy with how this project went and if I was to change anything I would take more test shots before taking finals.

Commission Unit – Environment Part 1 and Critical Appraisal

Documents

Transcript of Commission Unit – Environment Part 1 and Critical Appraisal