Progress

by LEN Final Major Project

My diary says it is 4 weeks until I hand in CRoP and 7 weeks until I hand in the MA FMP PDF. I have an ambitious delivery set and I am stretched but it is exciting and I continue to learn a lot.

Work in progress

  • This week work with video producer Yagiz Yeşilkaya, composer Deniz Güngören and curator Cemre Yesil to provide all the material needed for the you tube video. This is an exciting piece of collaboration in a short timescale. Collaborating with the expertise here can produce something so much more powerful than me working alone. Plan is to have completed video by November 20th with first draft around November 10th.
  • Tomorrow I am going to ESPACIO14 to measure up the gallery space for the exhibition in March/April. I will take photographs as well. Luis the owner is working with me on an artist statement which I will include in a separate post. Intent is then to produce a tear sheet and In Design proposal for the exhibition layout. To be ready by end November.
  • Work to do on the CRoP. In particular dig deeper in to each of the categories for the essay. A treasure of a read ‘On Photographs’ by David Campany this weekend.
  • The campaign work with the MS Society will kick in November, 19th with an interview with Lizzie Dowell, MS Society PR Manager. With the press launch end January their current focus is on work to deliver end November and end December releases. I include below my email to the MS team working with me.
  • Start thinking about the MA PDF.

Email to Zourhoure Holden (Campains) , Jenny Penninger (Campaigns), Tom Shelston (Marketing) and Lizzie Dowell (Press)

Tom/Zouhoure/Jenny/Lizzie,
Just to let you know everything is progressing.  I have ambitious deliverables but it is exciting, I am learning lots and I am committed to making it happen.  The youtube video is progressing.  I have a video producer working with me and a composer composing a piece for the work.  The collaboration is going well and will produce a very high quality piece of work. Lizzie if you want me to hold this video piece until you do your release that can work.  I am also working on an artist statement with Luis at the ESPACIO14 gallery space.  I append a draft.

Emotionally it is a strange experience assembling something from material I took when I was in a particular state which was different to the state I am now in.  My therapist talks about the process of remembering and forgetting that is necessary after a traumatic experience.  I am still in therapy and on antidepressants but with that help am enjoying life now.

Tell me if you need anything and talk to you 19th November Lizzie.

References

CAMPANY, D. 2020. On Photographs. Thames and Hudson.

Categories: Final Major Project, Project Development FMP

LEN

I am a Photographer. As well as taking many photographs I am currently studying for an MA in Photography at Falmouth University. I will direct my attention through the lens of my camera for the next couple of years and see what shows up. I see a photograph as a little bit of magic capturing a moment in time. If successful it surprises and engages your emotions. It tells a story about the wonders of being alive or tells us what we need to change to make it a better world to live in. That is enough for me to get going and then like walking a 1000 miles, which I did across the UK in 2010, or walking 200 miles across Cyprus, which I did in November last year, it is one step at a time.

I was a writer. The title of my unpublished book was ‘You Would Have Done The Same.' It is about a successful guy in love with his wife who lets her die when he discovers her in the process of committing suicide. The title gives a clue as to what I think you would have done. The book is 200 pages long. I found it cathartic to write it but after two years of work and reviewing with agents decided it probably needed another 2000 hours to get the whole book up to the standard of some of the pages. Writing is great but it is a lot of sitting down so I decided to get out and walk, play tennis, play bridge, go birding, watch football at Nottingham Forest, Arsenal and Valencia and anywhere else if I can, meditate, cook and eat. I was a writer who has so far failed to become an author.
I was a young man who loved Mathematics and thoroughly enjoyed getting a BSc at Liverpool University. While there I went often to Anfield and the Philharmonic Hall. I was all set on doing a PhD until I went for interview practice at BP and got seduced by the excitement of an International business career. BP was a great adventure building trading teams and businesses in London, Antwerp, Cleveland Ohio and Singapore. Fabulous people and some great challenges and also very hard work, constant jet lag and lots of fun along the way. I married Karen, my stunning wife, and had the most amazing time with her and our three boys Alex, Tom and Dan. She has multiple sclerosis and we have taken on many challenges together but somehow keep creating a new normal against the horrors thrown our way. She is the love of my life.

After BP I decided to coach senior executives and quickly realized I had a lot to learn
about what makes people tick. I had a fantastic 18 months on the International Programme of the Cleveland Gestalt Institute. A great faculty and a
wonderful group of people on the programme. We studied and worked in Dingle, Singapore, Holland, Cape Town and
Lisbon. This also got me interested in the way we think and make decisions so I studied for an MSc in Psychology atUniversity College London in 2010. The
Masters was in Cognitive and Decision Sciences and I found it fascinating what
we do know but also how much we don’t know about how we think and make
decisions.

I loved coaching and making a difference. I got a number of people to hear themselves, remove some of their own chains and free up the way they thought about the world. I remain fascinated by how people react to and engage with the world. My Masters thesis was why do two people given the same information make different decisions? Put simply, it is because each of us are unique in the way we are constructed.

Since returning from Singapore I found English winters tough so moved to Spain where I now live. The people are lovely, the scenery amazing, food delicious and the sun shines all the time. Almost.

All of these experiences will feed in to my time now as a Photographer. Three motivations I am lucky to have are enthusiasm, curiosity and a continuous interest in learning. All the time I look forward to meeting old friends and making new friends and experiencing this wonderful life together.