Assignment 3: A Photographic Commission; Early Days.

When I contacted my tutor with thoughts on subject matter for this assignment, I had various ideas.  My favoured genre is wildlife/landscape but I was looking for something a touch different and with some 'bite'.  I am always incensed when I see fly-tipping in our countryside, even on Nature Reserves and so-called beauty spots.  The idea of this as a subject crossed my mind when I researched Justin Jin earlier in the course. Not strictly fly-tipping, but worrying just the same, is the dumping of rubbish from ships and the resulting flotsam and jetsam, much of which is washed up on the shores of the Humber Estuary where I live.  I put these suggestions to my tutor and he has come up with the following brief:

Restrict yourself to the flotsam and jetsam of the estuary and tie it in with beachcombing? You're a beachcomber but instead of old pottery and coins you collect photographs of rubbish. You see the rubbish as a great subject for photography but you're also keen to raise important issues about the environment and have an exhibition of your photographs organised at a local museum. The magazine - lets say it's a serious, glossy nature or culture publication - wants to cover the exhibition and your work. They want some of your exhibition photographs - interesting rubbish aesthetically photographed on appropriate backgrounds (its important that you take them out of their estuary context so that they appear as a collection). They also want a few location shots of you collecting on the estuary. There should be one or two wide angle close ups with rubbish you've just discovered clearly visible - perhaps one with your hand in shot or a portrait closeup with rubbish, and a distance shot of you beachcombing alone to contrast the environmental beauty of the estuary with the overall theme of rubbish. If you have a second camera you could have this in shot. It will start with a double page spread and run over eight pages - a total of eight to ten shots. Delivery as usual via dropbox, files to be 2880 pixels longest side.

I am quite taken by this idea and more than happy to run with it.  I am reminded of the work of artist Martin Waters who has carried out work on flotsam and Jetsam at Spurn Point, has had a residency there and also exhibited installations of his work.  Another source which comes to mind is an article in the magazine of the Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust: Lapwings (Grapevine 2014).  The article is only a short one on a Beach Clean Up at Gibraltar Point.  The lower image in the article is the sort of thing I think my tutor has in mind for the assignment, although it will be me in the shot collecting 'found objects'.

Some initial images of jetsam from the dunes at Cleethorpes taken before my tutor came up with this brief:-

References
Grapevine(2014) Beach Clean at Gibraltar Point. Lapwings 143 P23
Walters, M. (2014) Installations-Assemblages-Paintings-Prints [online] Available from: http://www.martin-waters.co.uk/ [Accessed 01.05.14]