I’m still very impressed and a big fan of Niko’s work. It’s crazy how effective he is producing work, although I have a hard time understanding most of it… I’m still a bit confused about Nathan’s reaction to one piece of his work. I understand that it can be inappropriate to approach a serious subject without actual related experience and the effect of the work can hurt people who had those experiences. But wasn’t what Niko did trying to question those kinds of artwork? Anyway, I can’t have my attitude towards this without clearly understanding this work and the history, although I don’t think the value of Niko’s other work should be denied.
After seeing Niko’s work, I felt the subject of my work was so small that it’s not worth talking about… But I don’t really have a choice as the focus of my current world is myself.
Most of the conversations were about reading the meanings of my photos. Multiple people related the keyboard letters to technology although my point was communication. But I would say technology was a reason of my difficulty of communicating with the outside world. It’s good that people could read isolation, connectivity, sadness and loneliness from the photos, which were the overall atmosphere I wanted to convey.
I thought about the title today and I decided on FUTILITY. FREE OF USELESS ATTEMPTS was suggested in the critique but FREE isn’t very appropriate to describing the feeling of frustration after the useless attempts as I still have the desire to fill my empty inside but I don’t know how.
Jiao mentioned about removing myself from the photos. But In those settings, the interaction between me and the frame is necessary.
Adam suggested I could photograph situations of the useless attempts or moments when I feel those situations in different spaces online or offline without obvious staging, or maybe another staging. I still don’t know what to do next… I need think.
Adam also questioned the significant objects I used in the photos and he thought the relationship between the photos and the camera needed to be strengthened, which I had kind of realized. I’m not sure if I understand the second problem right though, the function and effect of photography don’t really show well in my photos. He also said my previous 5 photos were seductive but not the 6 photos. I guess they’re not nice photography work but just documentations of staged scenes. I think I do have to balance the setting of objects and the overall visual effect. It’s very hard for me to solve these two problems as they’re my usual way of thinking and producing work. But I know I have to face it and try to deal with it although I don’t know if I am able to at all.
I’m miserable. I don’t have belief in myself at all.
Eva Wang 