First interview complete!

I have just conducted my first interview with my family, this one being with my parents. Was actually quite nervous to do it weirdly, but now I have the first one out of the way the rest should follow soon. (Probably nervous because I was recording it and didn't want to hear my own voice to be honest.)

Very glad that the Dictaphone seems to work fabulously! Well except when the cat decided to jump on it and make it all muffly for a second or two. But hey couldn't exactly shut the cats out for it...not for an hour! Plus they are part of the family so they count!

Was successful and found out lots of information that I didn't actually know before, such as the family name "Smith" only came about because my Grandad Smiths Grandad, I think it was, had the middle name of "Melrose" which had something to do with the navy, which he was in. He decided he hated the navy, so moved into the army and changed his name to "Smith" hoping he wouldn't get caught. But apparently he did get caught and in those days, that was seen as treason so he got publicly hung. But ever since then, the family name was "Melrose-Smith" but my grandad decided to drop the "Melrose" bit when it came to his own kids.

Also found out that my parents have only ever moved as far as Southsea in Portsmouth, and then came back to Leigh Park because they needed a bigger place because my Mum was expecting my brother, so they applied for a council place and ended up back in Leigh Park, closer to the family again. And also found out that if I was a boy, then they wouldn't have moved out of that place as it would have been OK for two boys to be in the same room together, whereas because I was a girl, it wasn't, therefore they moved to the house that I then grew up in for eighteen years.

There is so much more information that I found out in my hour (yes a whole hour) long interview and I hope that the next ones with other members of the family such as Aunties and Uncles will reveal more.

So I'm very pleased this is all underway now!

Questions to ask family members

Here are some of the questions I want to ask my family before I head back to Uni in January. I'm sure will arise during the interviews but these are just a starter.

• Where are all partners of blood relatives originally from?
• Has anyone moved to the area from somewhere else?
• Where are grandparents originally from?
• How did partners meet? Where?
• Has anyone ever lived anywhere else? Where? When? Why?
• Has anyone ever had a job or career outside of the area?
• Where did family members go to school?
• Has anyone ever wanted to live anywhere else and why?
• If family members of the previous generation to me had gone to university, would they have been more tempted to move away?
• Which members of the family do people see the most?

How strange...

I've plotted my family members on a map today, and all of this who live in Leigh Park, the Warren and West Leigh all live in a line pretty much. It's very strange but kind of cool! I shall post a photo of it up soon for you all to see.

In other news...not much is happening. Need to get my head down after the weekend and Christmas is over with.

I have a...

...dictaphone on the way! Yay! Decided that if I'm going to do all the interviews with my family members...I better get a record of them all somehow. So my lovely dad has ordered me one from Sony at trade price which is about half retail...WIN! I should have this by the end of the week so interviews can begin soon! Another possibility is if we decided to have an exhibition with our final year work, I might consider playing these back to accompany the work. Or have them all on separate headphones. Not sure, but it's an idea to start thinking about I suppose.

A little update on things

So, today I've had the lovely 3 hour train journey back home to Havant! (Yay!) Which means..I can finally get going on my project! It'll probably take a few days to get properly going though, but I plan to ask my family members a series of questions each to find out why they live where they do and where the partners came from etc. I also want to begin looking at "artifacts" shall we call them, that were my Grandads, such as a tea set he brought back from one of his trips with the navy (I think) and a log book from when he worked on fixing peoples boats. Still not entirely sure why, but they're interesting and all part of the past, so will be good to look at and possibly photograph.

Dissertation wise, I've began reading some books about family photography and I've become quite interested in the snapshot and how it has developed over the past 10 - 15 years. For a start digital photography has wildly increased the amount of family snaps taken, but not many of these are actually printed and then put into the albums we're so used to seeing. A point came up in a seminar recently that it could be seen that Facebook is the new family album, which is an interesting thought that I may look into. It's definitely true to an extent. I've lost count of how many people put family photos up of important events such as weddings, births and parties.

So all in all, on track to begin everything...FINALLY!

Family ties

I began writing a little something in my artist statement to try and figure my ideas out a bit. Here it is, unfinished and extremely rough at the moment. But if it helps my brain, then it's all good!

Family is an interesting concept if you think about it. There are the blood relatives, but then there are the partners of these people who enter into the family. When it comes to my family, we all live relatively close to each other, but what I’m wondering is, have any of these non blood relatives had to move to be part of this. I know my cousin has married a Canadian, my brothers’ fiancé had moved from another county, but I want to find out if anyone else has moved like this. I also want to find out if there is some deep underlying factor that is holding everyone so close. It could be something as simple as everyone went to school in the area. Jobs could be a factor, and maybe the lack of people from my parents’ generation going to university has just prevented people from moving away. I know that me going to university away from where I grew up has made an impact on where I may decide to live and it’s definitely entered my mind that living in Wales is now an option.

Wall had been hit...

So since the last post, every time I looked at my work, nothing happened in my brain. It was not good and very worrying! So today has been a busy day, but made more busy by two extra tutorials. I am so glad I had these! My head isn't completely cleared, but I now know what to start doing.

First off, dissertation tutorial. My supervisor suggested completely moving away from the tourism idea, especially as I myself haven't really travelled, and my work has now moved away from that. With that in mind, it has been suggested I look into the family and how artists have approached this. So off to the library I went and got a few random books out to start looking at and hopefully over this weekend, things will start to become clearer and I'll actually have an idea to write about. I have also just watched the Genius of Photography: We are Family which was very interesting and has led me to a few more photographers. So as I said, this weekend is time to start reading and jotting ideas down, as time is going extremely quickly!

Next was my project tutorial. This has also cleared my head a little as I honestly didn't know what I was doing anymore. My lecturer has given me some ideas such as begin plotting where all my family live on a big map, start to make connections between people, like who sees each other the most etc. It may begin to look like a spiders web but who knows at this stage. It also became apparent that none of my family live particularly far away, and we are all in very close proximity. No one is more than a half hours drive away really, so these webs will become very interconnected and overlapped. This also led to the wondering of why hasn't anyone moved very far away, and who has compromised to live so close to everyone else, such as partners of family. I am going to compile a list of questions to ask all of my family members and see what arises. This could get very interesting, and at present, I have no idea how this is going to become photographic, but it is more important for me to get my idea going and start asking my family questions.

Hopefully things will be easier now.

And so the project is starting to take shape

Ok so in preperation for my seminars this week, both dissertation and project, things are beginning to take shape. My project is now losely based on the idea of maps, and how it can show whatever it wants to, depending on who the author and the user are. My map is going to show my childhood, and I want to create a collage work, with maps of areas where I grew up, surrounded by images and written accounts of my memories. I so far have a fair few images of me, family and friends in places I have strong connections with, such as my old family home. I am currently a little undecided whether this project needs new images of these places, as if I am mapping my childhood with memories (including the old photographs) surely new images wouldn't fit into this idea. However, this will be one of my main burning questions I will ask in my seminar on Friday. (I have already began taking some images of these places as they are now with a great deal of shock at how willing the current tenants are to let me shoot there.)

Above is an image of the garden of my old home, which seemed familiar and fairly similar to how I remember. Below is an image of the garden of my nans old house, which was a little different than I remember. First off, it seemed so much smaller than I remember, and secondly, a few things have changed such as the end of the garden is now full of bikes, rubbish and other garden waste. I have focussed on the gardens as I do have a lot of memories and photographs of these, and also the current tenants are much more willing to let me into the garden, rather than inside their home.

Dissertation is also beginning to seem clearer as the reading progresses. I have pages of quotes already, which is good! It will be on the idea of tourism, mainly focussing on the tourist maps and guide books and how they show a place at its best, selecting and structuring the photographs to make the destination look perfect. I am beginning to look into the role Kodak has played in the tourism industry, making photography cheap, simple and for the masses. I have also began looking at Martin Parr - Small World, and I might quite possibly look a little deeper into his work, depending on how things go. For now, I want to keep reading and home down my idea so I can begin writing the daunting 8,000 - 10,000 words.

Paris!

So, tomorrow I go to Paris with my uni course...and I am SO excited now! Just been looking at the little map me and my friend have and I'm so excited to become a complete and utter tourist on the first night and go see the Eiffel Tower etc. Then to go to Paris Photo, the Pompidou Centre and loads of other exhibitions! Cultural trip here we come!

Back to the world of blogging

So after three years without even looking or updating this blog, I have decided to completely revamp it. Goodbye old photos, hello new photos! There shall be some photos up soon from previous university projects, and also the current one. Hopefully this will help me keep track of everything. That is all for now!