ESTRANGED

A series of architectural abstractions shot on a Holga 120 camera, which is renowned for it's unpredictability and susceptibility to mistakes, an important technical decision embraced in the work. This project is about anxiety in the modern world and explores everyday feelings of nervousness felt in public spaces, particularly environments consisting of high-rise buildings where tension can be felt amongst the converging form of imposing buildings. Abstraction is used to communicate this experience of estrangement without being representative of the architectural structures as they are. Double exposures, prism lenses and intentional motion re-construct the world into views unseen by the eye, by nature they are both confusing and intriguing, which is how one can feel amongst the anatomy of built surroundings.

“From the very beginning of photography, architecture has been its most willing accomplice and photographers have continuously returned to the subject of the built environment to disrupt our perception of the world around us and draw our attention to the effect of the urban surroundings on our psyche. I was drawn to this body of work that employs strategies of distortion, blurred imagery, super imposition and double exposures to communicate an anxiety and general sense of discombobulation with the modern world. Transforming the hard angular lines of the skyscraper into soft unstable structures or by changing the orientation of the buildings to become the foundation for new ones, the photographer manipulates our existing landscape to offer up new architectural possibilities.”

• Alona Pardo (Curator, Barbican) SOURCE MAGAZINE Graduate Photography Online 2018 Selections