Book Project

[working title: Defaced]

The content for my photobook will be based on portraiture and the metamorphosis that takes place when used in a photogram. Although the two rarely go hand-in-hand the photogram is a perfect means for abstracting [or defacing] a portrait. By subjecting a portrait to the photogram process it becomes inverted and as a result it will no longer be a face... It will be a de-face.

To find my portraits I will be looking at figureheads and icons in contemporary society or modern history. Onto these faces I intend to place nails, screws, glass, wool, string, thread, beads and whatever else I can experiment with. In each case the original image will be come obscured or vandalised. Items such as screws can create connotations about tension or frustration depending on placement within the composition.

This projects my work into the grounds of the surrealists and Dadaist who dealt with collage, photograms, text and textures. It was also the Dadaists who worked with the 'found image' and through careful reworking [or sometimes very little reworking in the case of Duchamp's Ready Mades] created new and innovative work.

I will split the content into 3 sections: Politics, Film & Sound. Each of the sections will ideally have 10 images which bulks the project up to 30 pages plus titles and dividing pages. This is only a rough outline but I think [considering I will have to make a minimum of 5 copies] this may be long enough.

My primary sources of inspiration have been artists who have worked in collage or composite work:

-John Heartfield
-George Grosz
-Otto Dix
-Dave McKean
-Kurt Schwitters
-Wangechi Mutu
-Clunie Reid
-Santos R. Vasquez
-Kasimir Malevich