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I produce photographs that make familiar subjects iconic. I work very closely with the subject matter, taking hundreds of photographs and edit down to a singular image. The final exhibited photograph clearly recalls the moment the picture was taken, but is also open to wider possibilities of interpretation by the viewer. This duality is central to my practice. The photographs are intended to be read as single images, to focus attention on the potential meaning of each image, rather than building a reading in relation to a series of works. They are exhibited at a relatively large scale – 4 x 5 foot, to draw attention to the low key subject matter and imply an importance to the scene represented. This large scale print also maximises the impact of the composition and detail of the image.
The photographs can seem like half remembered scenes from childhood, clichéd images from advertising, or familiar motifs employed in popular landscape photography. They show sunlit white horses, impossibly still rabbits in the undergrowth, and trees with human faces. I want to plunder the territory between commercial and artistic uses of photography to play against our own private recollections and the relevance of our own individually significant emotive ties and readings.
Melanie Stidolph March 2009 |