Assignment five research: Poplar

As part of my research for the final assignment, I have been taking my camera around areas of London and taking the observational approach I adopted for Brixton in the previous assignment. I have opted to research around Poplar in the East End, Elephant and Castle, Ladbroke Grove and areas in the City. These areas all contain modernist housing estates, the majority built in the post-war period in order to house those made homeless from bombing.

What is interesting about these estates are the ideas of community they represent, ideas that drove the 1960s urban planners to completely reimagine British cities. Prestige projects such as the Golden Lane estate in the City divide opinion but are popular enough to have listed status. The less refined architecture of inner city estates, such as Robin Hood Gardens in Poplar, are derided and often dismissed as ‘sink estates’.

What is unclear is why these places began to be perceived as harsh places of social collapse. One idea that I have been interested in pursuing is reimagining these places through a set of images that examine an estate in London (or a number of estates). I am not sure if I will be focusing on one estate, although it would perhaps provide more focus to the project if I focused on a single estate and its surrounding area. Linking back to my research on ‘deadpan’ and the ‘new topographics’ (see previous posts), I would like to present detached, observational images of these areas/estates that are an appraisal of their meaning to the people who inhabit them, and also to some degree the wider city. What my images may show is at this stage not completely determined and hinges in part on what I may observe, but the images of Poplar (see below) hopefully give some idea of what the final set may look like.

So far I have shot at Robin Hood Gardens and the Balfron estate in Poplar, the Golden Lane Estate in the City, and also at Trellick Tower in Ladbroke Grove. I have both colour and monochrome images, which I will subsequently edit and post in sets when completed. I also plan to have a look at the Brunswick centre near Russell Square and perhaps if I have time have a walk around the Thamesmead area, so I will be adding further sets over the next 2-3 weeks. I also have some images shot in Elephant and Castle, particularly around the regeneration project going on at Elephant Park and the Goldfinger designed modernist housing on the roundabout.

The set below has been shot over a period of 1-2 months in Poplar at Balfron tower and Robin Hood Gardens. The former is listed and the latter has been earmarked for demolition. It has been interesting to walk around Poplar as it is a very diverse area culturally and in terms of its architecture, however I feel including both estates in a set and focusing on the area as a whole lacks focus. I have therefore focused more on the Robin Hood Gardens estate (see next post) and have decided it is better to focus on a smaller area for a series of 12 images.

The images have potential, and the square format and Ilford film certainly convey a sense of the architectural facade and general grittiness of the area. My main doubt though is how much the images reveal to the viewer of the people who live in Poplar? Are they architecture photos? This is something to bare in mind when shooting and cutting the photos into a set.

(Technique: TLR camera and Ilford PanF film, mostly shot at 1/125 – 1/500 from F/3.5 – F/8)

 

Exercise: Exploring function

For the first exercise of Part 3 of the course, I will be using my images from Danwon High School. I approached this shoot with this module in mind, and this fits into the first exercise brief nicely.

I had previously photographed the interview of two fathers whose children had perished in the Sewol ferry disaster in April 2014, and this project followed on from the interview. Myself and one more photographer were permitted access to the school to shoot the classrooms of the students who were lost last year. Most of the 2nd Grade perished in the disaster and many of the classrooms sat completely empty of students and teachers for the remainder of the year.

The focus of my images was to be the classroom space itself, the school the students spent so much of their time learning and growing into young adults. An empty school is slightly eerie but knowing why these classrooms stood empty was harrowing and shocking. I aimed to get across the design of the space and how it is intended to be used. I found the functionality of the classroom – empty chairs and desks, unused books, lockers with students names on – takes on a new, special significance when set in the context of the terrible events of last year, and my images convey something of this meaning to the viewer.

See the project write up here:

william513082a.prosite.com/395493/5935459/gallery/danwon-…

And in Photographers in Korea magazine:

www.madeinkorea.photography/photo-essays/sewol-a-tribute/

Assignment 2: A public event

There has been quite a lengthy gap between shooting the photos for this assignment and writing my reflection – a gap that I hadn’t planned but I’ve been happy with the time for reflection. I shot the “activity” itself two months ago in Korea, and I have been thinking over my choice of subject matter carefully.

Myself and another photographer had been asked to shoot an interview of families of the victims of the April 2014 Sewol ferry disaster in Korea, a tragedy that saw the loss of 300 people including over 200 school children. I shot the interview of two of the fathers of children lost in the disaster, who have been protesting since last year against the government’s handling of the accident and what they see as cover ups by the those at the top. The interview took place in Gwanghwamun square in the centre of Seoul, in close proximity to many government offices and not far from the President’s house.

I went into the shoot with some nerves as I realised the sensitive nature of the event and the fact that I may not have much time to get my shots. I was also aware that I may not have much control therefore I went in aiming to capture shots documenting the interview rather than attempting to intervene and pose the subjects. This was also in line with the requirements for Assignment two, so I looked for the “moments” that told the story and explained the event.

The interview started off quite tense for all parties, the interviewer was not a Korean speaker and the fathers could not speak English so there was a translator at the ready. I noticed immediately how tired the fathers looked and they both talked quietly and softly in response to the first set of questions. 

The father above was much more animated and you could clearly see that he spoke for the pair as he was willing to give longer answers and warmed up to the interview much faster than the other.

The father above was more pensive and reserved and you could see the sense of hopelessness and desperation etched into his face over the state of the protest. It is worth noting that these two men (along with many other families of the victims of the sinking) have been living in the square for the entire time since the sinking. At the time of the interview this was 10 months. They sleep in tents in Gwanghwamun square, wash in subway station toilets, and refuse to give up their vigil until they have received a satisfactory explanation of what happened to their children.

As the interview wore on, I noticed the other father started to warm up to the questions and gave an extremely vivid and heartfelt account of the day he went to pick up his son’s body and went into the public mortuary to identify him for the police. As he gave this account the translator (see photo above) looked incredibly moved and struggled with the rest of the translation for the questions.

As the interview wrapped up we thanked the fathers who thanked us in turn and asked for our future support for the Sewol parents’ cause. We walked outside with the fathers who retreated to their tent for some lunch and we melted back into the busy Seoul crowds. The shot above shows a part of Gwanghwamun square, the ribbons tied to the benches are in support of the Sewol parents protest.

Overall it was a difficult event to shoot and I was happy with the final set of images. I shot both digital and film shots, but once again found the frames from the roll I shot on the day better captured the intensely personal moments of the interview. If I was to shoot it again I would approach with perhaps a different aim in mind, focusing not just on straight portraits of the subjects but perhaps aim to capture different gestures, a range of expressions, or focusing on different body parts such as hands or the back of the head. Not being able to control the shoot was a strange scenario for myself as I have had little experience of documenting events and journalistic scenarios such as magazine interviews. Some control over the shoot would have been welcome and I would have liked to set up portraits of the fathers rather than shooting as they talked, but for the shots I did get I was pleased with the consistency, and the fact it showed a few personal moments from a difficult interview.