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aishanortheast · 3 years

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Aisha Northeast RESEARCH REPORT

Major Project Title

(Or working title - how and why did this title develop?)

My title for this project is Black, white, ugly & beautiful, deciding on a title for a project is something that I normally always struggle with because for me I do not find it easy to come up with a title before my project has started to take shape but this title seemed to come quite naturally as soon as I had established my intentions for the project. Once I had decided on what I wanted to achieve with this project, I knew that I wanted the title to reflect that in a very direct but uncomplicated way.

The reason I chose to call it this was it reflects the journey to self love that I was on at a young age and the sense of displacement and conflict of identities that I am exploring in my work. The idea is that you could feel like you are all of these things, some of them or none of them, it also challenges beauty standards today look like. I believe this title refers to the notion that race and beauty have become intertwined and what is classed as beautiful is never stationary.

Research Methods

(What methods have you used during this phase of the project and how have they helped you develop your ideas and inform your major project proposal?)

During the beginning phase of this project, I was very focused on collecting influential photographers and materials that I could take inspiration from. I did not go into this project with clear intentions of what I wanted to create, so it was very important for me to look at as much work as I could to get a clearer vision on what I wanted my project to become. I looked at a lot of visual material and tried to research deeper into projects that I felt I connected with in some way, doing this I found that I connected with a lot of work that resinated with my and my own experiences growing up. This process really helped me to realised what my vision for the project was and what I wanted my idea for this project to be.

One of the first things that I became interested in during my initial research was a film called Queen and Slim, the film itself really left a mark on me, not only because the storyline spoke to me but the cinematography was beautiful. The film was shot in New Orleans, Louisiana, Cleveland and Ohio and featured beautiful scenes in parts of rural America that we often don’t get to see. I felt that I really connected with the production and I knew I wanted to create something inspired by it, whether it was the love story of the character’s or recreating some of the scenes with still image or creating looks inspired by the wardrobe in the film. I then found a Photographer called Andre D. Wagner, a photographer from Brooklyn who had been commission to take stills on the set of the movie. One project of his that stood out to me was a series called Cedric, which was a series of images of a boy who he had met in 2014 and continued to shoot for years. The images told a story of a young black boy becoming a man, and reflected a mush wider story of being young a black in America. His work on and off the set was incredible and really helped me to see how I would expand my idea into someone a bit more personal.

I also looked at a series called Pastoral Interlude 1988 by Ingrid Pollard that my tutor suggested I take a look at. The series aimed to challenge the notion that black people are only ever seen in urban enrolments, by creating images of black people in picturesque countryside locations. This series resinated with me and my experience growing up in a small village being the only mixed race child in such a wide open space, I was the source of many questions and curiosity. Though I look back at my experience as a young child getting so much attention I don't feel as though I was subjected to any kinds of prejudice, I do feel a certain sense on unease with the idea of my being ‘the only one’.

Pilot Project

(What have you achieved through the development of your pilot project/s? What have you learned from the process? Identify the main concepts that might direct or drive your major project.)

My pilot project began with an idea to create project that reflected my experiences growing up, I wanted to present something that was personal and would tell a story that people might be able to find comfort in. Once I had this idea the obvious next step was deciding how I was going to use my photography to bring this idea to life. I then decided that I wanted to try and connect with the time in my life and go through some of my family archives, and I was very surprised just how interesting it was looking at some of the images of my family before and after I was born. The images brought back memories and feelings that had been long forgotten and I decided to create a photo-book of the some of the images to help me realise my idea a bit better. The process of creating this photo-book was key in developing my idea for the project further as it became the basis of it.

Then I decided I wanted to go back to village that I grew up in shoot with my sister as if she were me, my idea was to capture a series of images that could accompany the photo-book. The first shoot I did was in our old family home that I moved to when I was young, I went into the shoot with a very loose idea of what I wanted it to look like and I was very happy with the outcome. I thought the images were somber and reflective to my past. The second shoot location was in the main village I grew up in, and again aesthetically I was very happy with the images but I decided that they were not going to communicate to the audience what I wanted them to. I realised that shooting in these locations that were so close to my heart where almost clouding my judgment to how successful they were. I decided that using my sister did not work and they just made the series confusing.

I do not see these images as a complete failure because although they did not work for this project, they pushed me to push myself and look at the project from another perspective. I am now going to create a series that is stronger and links to the photo-book more directly. For me the Pilot Project was vital to really establishing what I wanted to do for my major project, it allowed me to develop on from my initial idea and expand on what I actually wanted it to look like. Although it was not as much practical development, I was able to create a photo-book that will now act as the storyline to my images and basis of my project. Moving forward I have a far more clear-cut plan of what I want to do for my major project and I feel confident that I will be able to create something that I can be proud of.

Audience and Context

(Has a consideration of Context and Audience made you think about your project in a particular way? Have you been aware of the histories, conventions and audience expectations of particular contexts? Have you considered different contexts and how have you responded to them?)

This project is very heavily reliant on context, as it is a very personal project and for that reason I have spent a lot of time considering what I want to explore through this work. One of the main issues I have faced in my exploration is the fact that my intentions for my project are to present my own experiences through my photography, I want the images to open up a number of subjects that affect modern society but I do not want to overload the audience with too much. This has also meant that I have spent a lot of time, researching artists who have explored similar subject matters to get a sense of how they balanced context with aesthetics.

I am using this work to narrate my experiences and allowing the audience to view this from my own perspective. Exploring themes like race have always had their difficulties because they can often be ignored by those who do not feel that they are represented in the work. In terms of the audience I envision this work will speak to anyone who will listen, so for that reason I do not intended this work to be seen by a particular audience. I do however suspect that the project will resinate more with an audience that can relate to the themes that I am exploring, but I also believe that for those who cannot relate on a mutual level will still be able to recognise themselves in this work.

Production and Presentation

(Discuss the production methods you have been exploring through your pilot project. What effects do these different approaches/ visual strategies have on the work? What choices have you made in the refinement of your visual approach and why? Is the approach you have chosen effective in communicating your ideas to the identified audience?)

During my pilot project one of my main issues was trying to figure out how I was going to present this work, I do not want the work to reply to heavily on the how it is exhibited because I want the work to be versatile in terms of where it could be presented for example I want the images to work on there own as well as with the photo-book. I also have to consider the logistics as we are currently limited by COVID restrictions and I am not sure how long these restrictions will last and how they will impact the way that my work will need to be presented.

I initially just wanted the work to be presented as a series of printed images, but as after having the idea to use archive family photos it changed a few things in relation to the concept of the project. I then decided that I was going to create a photo-book, and incorporate the two ideas to create a less flat visual experience. I have also been working on creating a video from an old family video, with the intention of creating a more immersive exhibition of images, a book that you can touch and a video or audio.

Visual References / Bibliography

(List the key visual and critical references you have explored during the research process. Discuss how useful these references were for the project and what you learned from them).

Ronan Mckenzie - Our Place

Mckenzie photographed the ‘Our place' campaign in 2019, the campaign featured a family that welcomed Mckenzie into their home. The images depict the power of a communal meal, family cooking and eating together. Along with a beautiful series of stills, there was also a video of the family enjoying their meal which reflected the style of a home video. I love these images because they tell a story in a honest and caring way, similar to how I intended to capture my own project.

Ingrid Pollard - Pastoral Interlude 1988

This series resinates with me and my experience growing up in a small village being the only mixed race child in such a rural area, I was the source of many questions and curiosity. Though I look back at my experience as a young child getting so much attention I don't feel as though I was subjected to any kinds of prejudice, I do feel a certain sense on unease with the idea of my being ‘the only one’. The images challenge traditions and force the audience to question their own ideas of black identity

Deana Lawson

Deana Lawson is an American artist, educator and photographer, based in Brooklyn, New York. Her work focuses on contemporary social issues of intimacy, family, spirituality, sexuality, and Black aesthetics. Lawson creates intimate depictions of Black bodies interacting in both public and private spaces, Paying careful attention to cropping and to detail and meaningful domestic interiors. Regardless of where her photographs are taken, saturated colour continues to be a signature feature of Lawson’s practice.

Antwaun Sargent - The New Black Vanguard

This book is an exploration of blackness, and black beauty. I have been reading this book for my dissertation and I have found it so interesting, to see black photographers creating images that are breaking barriers that have been created by black invisibility in the photography industry. This book helped me find inspirational photographers and their work.

Micaiah Carter

Carter is an American fashion photographer, who was featured was in The New black Vanguard, his work is bold and full of life. Carter uses his work to pay homage to his father who grew up in the 70’s an era defined by black empowerment and the ‘black is beauty’ movement. I was interested in this work because of the connection between the images and Carter’s own life.

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aishanortheast · 3 years

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Aisha Northeast MAJOR PROJECT PROPOSAL

Project Title (or working title)

Black, White, Ugly & Beautiful

Subject / Concept

(What the project is about?)

My project is visual journey to understanding my own identity as a mixed race woman, as someone who struggled to love themselves from a very young age and still feels a sense of displacement to her own family heritage. The work is inspired by my family, my childhood, and the impact that growing up being the only mixed race child in a small village had on me growing up. I am using my family archives to explore the types of people my family were and are today and using these images to try to find connections with the people who raised and influenced me. I have always been fascinated with mixed heritage families and for me I have always wondered the impact of growing up with parents of different racial, ethnic and faith backgrounds. I want the work to express my own conflicting emotions growing up and feeling like I had little to no connections to either side of my family backgrounds and how that moulded me. I want to represent my own relationship with British culture, race and beauty, and use this as a record of my struggles to connect with those things.

Aims

(What do you want to achieve?)

I am going to create a series of images inspired by the photo-book I have created for my pilot project. The images are going to reflect my own conflicting feelings to being mixed white British and Nigerian and my struggles with race, beauty and self love. The images will reflect my own experiences throughout my childhood, the struggles of being a teenager and what becoming a woman has meant to me. I am also going to take influence from the images that I have chosen for the photo-book, whether that be recreating the tones of the images, or recreating outfits that my family wore. I also want to take influence from fashion photographers like Micaiah Carter who is a young American fashion photographer whose work is widely influence by his father, who grew up during the ‘black beauty’ movement and disco. His work explores what it was like for his father growing up in the 70’s and recreates those moments in his own way.

Context / Audience

(Where will it be seen / who is it for?)

I want this work to be featured in a space like a gallery, where you can experience the project as a whole, with the photo-book and its accompanying materials. This is important to the context of the images because although I want the images to speak aesthetically I am also exploring a larger story.

I believe that this project will resinate with a lot of people who are like me or not like me because I believe what I am exploring everyone can relate with in some way or another, whether it is struggling with self love, self identity or just trying to connect the dots of family history. I want people to connect with my work even if they do not share my experiences and feel that they can relate to it nevertheless.

Proposed form, medium, presentation

(How will you execute it and present it?)

I am intending to capture images in spaces that mean something to me or places from my own memories. I would like to use some self-portraits and some still life images that mirror my photo-book. During my pilot project I experimented with digital and film using a disposable camera, after seeing the outcomes, I will be using digital to capture these images. To do this I will need some time to set up and design sets for the shoots and to then shoot the images. I want create high quality prints of these images around 5 -7, that will be hung on the wall in various frames that will also reflect the narrative.

In terms of the exhibition of this project, although I am not 100% on this, I am intending on using the images, photo-book and maybe a video to create a complete visual experience.

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aishanortheast · 3 years

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Final Photo Book

This is my photo-book in PDF form, as I have been unable to create an actual photo-book due to having to self isolate, and then being placed into a national lockdown.

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aishanortheast · 3 years

Video

This is a video from a holiday when I was about 9 years old, I would like to incorporate this video into my Major project some how but I am not sure how to do that.

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aishanortheast · 3 years

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Photo-book Cover Designs

I have designed some potential covers inspired by an album cover for an album cover for ‘Queen and Slim’s’ soundtrack. I designed these by creating cut outs of some of my family photos’s, I thought that the loudness of these covers would juxtapose the simplicity of the photo-book I have created.

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aishanortheast · 3 years

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Text for photobook

This book is a visual document of my family both before and after I was born. I have created this compilation of family photos because I have always wondered what kinds of people they would have been, had my mum not been so determined to see what life was like outside the small village she grew up in. I wonder if my grand-parents ever imagined that they would have mixed heritage gran-children, and I wonder if that is something they welcomed with open arms and or did the idea take some time to adjust to. I have always looked at my mum as someone who is brave and independent, her courage to venture outside what was comfortable and find out what there was beyond it, her lack of content with the idea of seeing the same faces everyday. The images I have chosen are all important to me because they mirror one another, they communicate a shift in attitudes and challenge what a ‘traditional’ family looks like today. The process of choosing the images is what I have enjoyed the most, some of these images I had never seen before, and just seeing moments and objects that I had forgotten over-powered me with emotions, and some are images I see all the time and have provided me with comfort when I needed it.

My grand-parents are traditional people they met when my Nan was 19 and my Gramps was 21, they married and had my mum 2 years later and then had my uncle 13 years later. The reason for the huge age gap was because my nan struggled to have children after my mum, they tried IVF for many years and when it finally took my nan fell pregnant with triplets yes triplets, though my uncle was the only one who survived. This also meant that for a long time my mum was an only child which she found difficult, and with such a big age gap between them their relationship was less of a typical sibling relationship. 9 years later during my mums degree she met Jubril Amodu a happy go luck Nigerian who swept her off her feet and fell pregnant with me, I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall when my mum brought my dad home to meet the family. My nan said she cried for 3 days when my mum told her she was pregnant, I think she was worried for my mum or maybe it had something to do with the fact her daughter had brought a black man home and was now knocked up, I guess we will never know. 9 months later I was born in Edmonton hospital in east London, I was almost 10 pounds and I have been told the doctors made bets on how much I would weight apparently I just kept on coming which for me is an extremely visual description that I could have done without. My parents relationship did not last, something to do with lying and stealing my mums bike and even though my mum did the best she could as a single mum, it wasn’t long before me and my mum were back in the village.

Growing up in a small village had its perks compared to London, I was much less likely to be hit by a car and people left their front doors unlocked because everybody knew each other. Which I’m sure made things a lot easier for my mum being that I was the only mixed race child in the village if I ever got lost my description would not have needed much detail. I remember my first day at St Marys School, it was a very small school only went to year 3. I started in year 2 which must have been hard enough, not to mention the elephant in the room that was my complexion. I don’t really remember much but I do remember little snapshots like the fact that the school was behind a church and to get to it you had to walk through a graveyard and I remember bringing my hair for show and tell and the whole class toughing it with such amuse on their faces. Although I mention these things now I was never really aware that it was my race that turned heads, just my shining personality and I am extremely grateful for that time of blissful naivety. I was not until I was much older that I become aware of my own skin and the fact that I didn’t look like my family, with my dad not really in the picture anymore I was alone. Which resulted in what some would call a small identity crisis, and by identity crisis I mean years and years of wishing that I was white and feeling guilty for it.

Rejecting my racial identity was and still is something that I struggle with today, because although I feel blessed to be of mixed heritage today, I still have this sense of not quite fitting in. I am either too black or too white and for me this goes way beyond just the colour of my skin, it is about the way I see the world around me, and the way I feel seen by the world. For years I looked at myself in the mirror and prayed for straight hair, for a lighter complexion and a more feminine figure. I hated the summer because it meant that I would tan and be even darker, I never wore my hair down because it was so thick and curly, I was always the biggest and the loudest in school, and it didn’t help that grew at an alarming rate and had the physique of someone twice my age. I resented my own blackness not because I was made to feel that way, nobody ever told me being black was ugly but nobody ever told me that black was beautiful.

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