Controls and divides within the city

Another I have began exploring was inspired by the work of Paul Graham and his images taken in Northern Ireland. Like Graham I am interested in exploring the ways in which we are controlled in society, in particular the city. The development of one way systems, controlled zones, fences, barriers, partitions, security and cctv all contribute to not only the physical aesthetics of our environment, but also they way in which we interact with it. I spent time, prior to photographing simply observing peoples actions around such areas, I found it extremely fascinating how people respond when presented with such obstacles, for example a path, or road markings which guide our route through the city, the majority of people tend to adhere to these pre set paths, even if it does take them off route, some people on the other hand, intentionally break these. In some cases stepping over obstacles or “cutting through” as appose to walking around. In one of my images, you can see an area of grass in the middle of three busy main roads, there is an attempt at a subtle barrier around the grass area and a foot path around it, however there is a muddy trail which indicates that people do pass through the area instead of walking around.

Another observation is areas where sections are divided out into smaller and more compact portions. They are often separated by small barriers. My interest in this is my curiosity in regards to why they are there and what purpose they serve. Despite the presence of the barriers they are so small that they can easily be passed over. 

In Manchester, many residential areas are formed in estates and take on a grid like structure whereby areas are divided in squares and divided by taller fences, often with small paths running through them; this reinforces this idea that our route through these areas is controlled. Finally the idea that we are constantly being watched via cctv, especially in the city centre, there are camera’s absolutely everywhere and there aren’t many places where you can escape being recorded. I think this aspect of the project could easily be compared to the work of Phillip Lorcia DI corcia and the way in which he photographs people without consent, or his subjects being aware. To me this is very much the same as cctv recording!

if i were to peruse this theme one other aspect i would definitely want to look at is the way in which the camera can be compared to a gun (reference from book - susan sontag on photography)

i would like to take some photographs of busy streets in the centre of manchester and apply some coloured filter and framing grid as to make the subjects captured appear to be being framed by a gun...