Photo Project
OKAY! I was unable to create a slideshow, but all of my photos are on flickr at this address:
I Have This Thing About Boxes
(That's the title)
There were a few different ideas going on in my head at the time that I was shooting, but the main theme is consumerism and more broadly capitalism. The order is important, because the first photo you see is of my friend looking at a box, and she said, "I have this thing about boxes", which I thought was such a telling example of how much our lives revolve around things that don't really have any meaning (like small ornate boxes).
Among that overarching theme, I also focused on an obsession for nostalgia that is present in American society. This is almost self reflexive in a way, because I also like to photograph old things--they're just usually more interesting to look at. In Mcluhan's book, he says "In the name of 'progress', our official culture is striving to force the new media to do the work of the old". Because we arrive at new technology so quickly, the old quickly becomes the stylish, and that's kind of what I wanted to capture with my photography.
On a few photos ("Dat Goddess Tho" and "Twinning Hardcore") I wanted to focus on how capitalism made holy things into commodities, like Confucius and Cleopatra. In the same store, I found a very large crystal, already out of place in a store in Appleton, Wisconsin, and to add to the bizarre nature of seeing a two by one foot crystal, it had this sign on it that said "Please Don't Touch, I am a fragile piece of nature" which is just utter bullshit. The people in the store took it out of some sort of natural habitat, probably touched it a lot, and then put this condescending sign on it for customers. Like we're going to disrupt the flow of nature more than they already have. What.
Yay, consumerism!
I Have This Thing About Boxes
(That's the title)
There were a few different ideas going on in my head at the time that I was shooting, but the main theme is consumerism and more broadly capitalism. The order is important, because the first photo you see is of my friend looking at a box, and she said, "I have this thing about boxes", which I thought was such a telling example of how much our lives revolve around things that don't really have any meaning (like small ornate boxes).
Among that overarching theme, I also focused on an obsession for nostalgia that is present in American society. This is almost self reflexive in a way, because I also like to photograph old things--they're just usually more interesting to look at. In Mcluhan's book, he says "In the name of 'progress', our official culture is striving to force the new media to do the work of the old". Because we arrive at new technology so quickly, the old quickly becomes the stylish, and that's kind of what I wanted to capture with my photography.
On a few photos ("Dat Goddess Tho" and "Twinning Hardcore") I wanted to focus on how capitalism made holy things into commodities, like Confucius and Cleopatra. In the same store, I found a very large crystal, already out of place in a store in Appleton, Wisconsin, and to add to the bizarre nature of seeing a two by one foot crystal, it had this sign on it that said "Please Don't Touch, I am a fragile piece of nature" which is just utter bullshit. The people in the store took it out of some sort of natural habitat, probably touched it a lot, and then put this condescending sign on it for customers. Like we're going to disrupt the flow of nature more than they already have. What.
Yay, consumerism!
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