Category: Foundation 4D 1 – G4

For the first assignment, I dealt with communication between people with a public sphere element – payphones being in public areas, one side of the communication is “for all to see and hear”.

For the second assignment, I dealt with communication between people with a private sphere element – the sofa in your home.

Both of which I tried to deal with the ideal of a fleeting communication. With regards to the first project, in the past, people used to call a lot using payphones as they were easily accessible since handphones were not the norm. Now payphones are still around although harder to find. This project was sparked off by my mum using the payphones on the way to the market to call me. While in the second project, I was dealing with a space that I felt most of the conversation/communication would occur in a home apart from the dining table (some families have a “no talking while eating policy”). Yet, for this project, I’m not sure if I want to still deal with a particular space. I was thinking of moving on into a white-washed and clean place for the video.

Also, with regards to subject matter, I’m thinking of moving on from the previous two projects whereby I was concerned with communication between family members in the second project, and in the first (sorta anyway, in a way at least, since it sparked from my mum using a payphone to call me) although it was definitely not limited to calls between family members. For this project, I would like to explore the communication I have between me and my sister. We don’t talk very often now. We used to at least. I guess it’s all part of growing up and becoming busy and having no time for each other.

 

In all, explore relationship with my sister. Reconciling even?
Overarching idea is the utilitarian idea of family relationships. How they are all quite messy and complicated.

 

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PRELIMINARY 50 WORD NARRATIVE

Mei. Are you there?
Mei. I’ve missed you.
Mei. Do you know how much I missed you?
Mei. Can you hear me?
Mei. Don’t push me away.
Mei. Happy birthday, I bought you a soft toy.
Mei. Work hard. And come back to me.

Comments:
– Cut out a few sentences so that it’ll be stronger.

 

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Prof asked at the end of lesson, where I intended to film it. I replied that I was thinking of 2 backgrounds.

1. Clean white room – white walls, white floor.
2. Bedroom – beds.

The first location is because I was thinking that maybe it should be clean and non-distracting. It is a stark contrast between a empty white-washed room and 2 people inside interacting. There would be this form a displacement in a sense, and hence the attention is concentrated on the 2 people.

The second location is because my bedroom is the place where most of the communication I have between me and my sister is held. It is our shared intimate space. Since we are usually working in opposite ends of the house, it is only in the bedroom before we sleep do we play with each other or talk to each other more deeply than just the superficial level. Even so, nowadays, this has decreased since both of us are even busier, yet it has staunchly remained in this place.

I don’t have a white room to take photos and try. Neither do I know where.
I did take photos of my bedroom and beds to give a sense of how everything plays out.

Overall view of the bedroom where both me and my sister sleeps and interacts the most.

Zoom in on the area where my sister sleeps

The area where my sister sleeps (top part)

The area where I sleep (top part)

 

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I’m not exactly sure of my direction yet hence I went to search for artists and their works which deal with intimate family relationships.

ARTIST RESEARCH – MONA HATOUM

Measures of Distance (1988)

It is a video work comprising of several layered elements. Firstly, letters written by Hatoum’s mother in Beirut to her daughter in London appear as Arabic text moving over the screen. They are read aloud in English by Hatoum. The background images are slides of Hatoum’s mother in the shower, taken by the artist during a visit to Lebanon. Taped conversations in Arabic between mother and daughter, in which her mother speaks openly about her feelings, her sexuality and her husband’s objections to Hatoum’s intimate observation of her mother’s naked body are intercut with Hatoum’s voice in English reading the letters.

The main thing that comes across is a very close and emotional relationship between mother and daughter(it also discusses about exile, displacement, disorientation and a great sense of loss as a result of the separation caused by war). The work is constructed visually in such a way that every frame speaks of literal closeness and implied distance.

 

+ and – (1994 – 2004)

Although this work has nothing to do with relationships, I found this piece quite poetic. Although what I feel is completely differently from what the artist probably intended, I have my own take on it. To me, I feel that jagged knife-rake part represents sort of the way my sister leaves this sadness and anger in me(due to us being not close, frustrations within the relationship etc), and the smooth knife smooths out the textures left behind by the rake is me in a way trying to reconcile with myself internally and my sister. And this goes on and on, because life is symbolically quite cyclical and keeps going on and on, there will always be new problems/grievances, but there will always be smoothed out.

 

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My original idea is to video my sister and me doing a very interpretative sleep-dance sort of thing which tells a story of our relationship. I was thinking of doing a sort of part 2 of my A levels video installation(which I’ll link down below). I approached my sister telling her my concept of videoing her again. However, she violently refused as she has upcoming A levels too. So yep, I can’t touch her. And there goes my idea of doing an interpretative story video.

 

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A Levels Video Installation (for reference of the original idea I had of doing and the components that I was thinking of including and it’s significance)

To explain some elements in the video. This is just the original video taken and not the final work. The final video is a stop motion with 2 layers of videos playing at the same time. The final work is an installation, whereby there are two single size beds placed side by side erected up vertically onto a wall. At the base on the floor, there are 2 soft toys that I made from red cloth and filled with saga seeds.

Saga seeds: a representation of love(not necessarily between couples for me) and memories. I remember I used to go exploring with my sister and we would pick saga seeds from the ground as souvenirs from our adventures.

Beds: As mentioned earlier, bedrooms are very intimate spaces. For me and my sister, this is where most of the communication happens – right before we sleep or just taking a break from our respective daily activies to play and chat for a while.

Soft toys: Soft toys are a medium in which we communicate. They are like proxies as we project ourselves onto them. We used to (and still do albeit lesser) play with them by creating stories and giving each toy a different persona. We would then through this discuss our day and talk about endless other topics and go on adventures. The soft toys chosen are the ones that we love the most out of our relatively extensive collection that presides on our beds.

 

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Anyway because of the setback, I had to tweak my idea. Instead, I went to video my sister studying. She saw me videoing her but since I’m not directly disturbing or disrupting her studying, she was quite okay with it.

I wasn’t sure how to best do it so I took many different angles of her studying. Below are the different tries:

From back top down angle

Diagonal top angle

Diagonal table top angle

Side top angle

Frontal closeup angle

Diagonal top-up angle

Side table-top angle

 

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Personally, I like the close up frontal view and the top down view from behind her. I feel that these viewpoints are more interesting.

 

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During her study break, I was talking to my sister. I recorded this conversation with her that is 18 mins long.

Some notes:
– every line break signifies change in speaker
– my mum came into the room halfway to ask about lunch options – I left out this section
– lines like this <…> mean that the other person is talking at the same time in the middle of the speaker’s sentence

The following is the transcript:

This is the kakao talk character ryan

what’s the kakao talk

Kakao talk is like line

oh the korean version ah

actually line also korean if I’m not wrong

really ah i thought china ah

i dunno japan or korea. you see the vegetable ah he always hide then he suddenly come out

i bet the horse costume very hard to…

very hard, he keep bumping into people and he can’t walk

very heavy also

actually the one in the middle he wanted a young master costume but in the end this count? came

oh they get to pick what costume they want?

ya they get to pick

and then the guy pick a cabbage?

no actually he wanted cheese one eh but then because that one got rabbit so he wanted to be a cabbage in the end. haha damn funny they keep tripping over each other hahaha he can’t turn. freaking funny. hahah they change the choreography damn funny. and then hands up he can’t put his hands up. but not bad ah they can dance inside

but quite cute eh

every year they will have this kind for halloween

that’s so cute

ah then you watch this, coming already, you see what he do. he’s supposed to dance like the shoulder, in the end he drink water

was that purposely smack the-

i don’t know

cabbage costume i cannot

he very cute, he always hide and then suddenly come out

eheh so cute, i love his cabbage. that one’s bumping

damn cute every year they will do this kind, there’s one year they did uh even for choo seok right

what’s choo seok?

mid-autumn. they dance in those- wait i show you

why never tick anything off your revision list

it’s supposed to be every week i’m supposed to do eh

ARE YOU SERIOUS

most of them i write per week per week, unless i never state…why?

do you accomplish them?

uh not all haha. cos i always go school. i go school almost every day. they do this. the 95-liner, means they born in 95 right. they have problem with the headband, damn funny

why 95 liner what what what’s the

95 liner means – eh don’t touch the, just take the tissue, cos a bit dusty, they have problem. it keeps- normally we, in korea, koreans call it like 95-liner that kind. 94-liner. cos they’re born in that year. they are this kind of activation. you see the head, got problem with it. the other one, this one also

this also for halloween is it

this one is for choo-seok thats why they dress up in traditional costume

don’t look very traditional leh

uh, by right it is lah

it’s like the taobao cheapo version, know what i mean right

oh i know i know i know

like, like, ya lor. cos yesterday right, during cca right. then we were looking at costumes right. for this new dance right.then suddenly my vice-chair was rage-moding down there

why?

she’s like, this one is the fake kind

really?

as in, the taobao fake kind.

<aiya it’s like that one ah, ah they have this kind>

then she show this is the more real kind, then she was like. oh you see the sleeve here like that. it should be like that not like that then then she was like. wah then she started rage-moding, ranting about how to tell which range is the real one

this is halloween 2 years back

oh they always film in this studio

this is their dance studio actually. the other one that they film in is nowadays they use that one

<hehe charlie chaplin>

cos their choreography getting bigger

and ya the costume also getting bigger lah. the horse take up how much space sia

actually this one, the beggar, whatever he is ah, very funny

beggar, no lah! he’s supposed to be from jail. what beggar sia

ya ya ahah. i think it’s psychotic

joker

he

what’s this? am i supposed to know

i dunno i can’t remember

[Mummy comes in here]

they have different appeal, like this one. this is freaking funny. i mean like, it’s not THAT funny but he keeps laughing. but this is the actual choreography ah actually. but they change here a bit. there he start laughing for no reason

eheh so funny, he trying so hard

he is this one actually

oh i didn’t know your phone behind got picture now. oh you put inside. why never put a picture of me and you why you put of him

that’s damn long already

why you never put us why you put him

i don’t have

what don’t have, we go take a photo then i go print

<don’t want>

how bout that, i go print. we put a photo of us at the back of your phone.

i wanna remove already

wh- YA remove ah! remove him then put us ah.

dowan ah.

why dowan. this unknown person then there’s like both of us. why you wanna put some

<wait still have>

unknown korean guy who doesn’t even know-

—

still have.

what still have, you never answer my question ha,

<eh shh>

never answer my question you better put our picture haha

there he keep laughing again. HAHah. actually this is one of their easiest choreography, but then horh you know, in concerts on stage they have the real bed. and the bed is the normal kind of mattress, so when they stand very- you know

oh not easy

then they always fall from it, freaking funny

this studio looks so much smaller though

it’s quite small actually. but actually you know, all these doors behind. it’s like another room one

ya la of course ah

why so weird

ya why you need 3 doors, 4 doors. heheh freaking 4 doors 1, 2, 3 4

but actually a lot of things inside this kind of room one eh

maybe it’s like, storeroom. like one of them storeroom, another one-

but they can sit inside also.

where the guy suddenly pok out from

the bed ah

as in, he wasn’t in the original con-

is.

orh. my god, so act cutes

this song is like that what. this song is, ya Embarrassed. actually got two names, one is Blanket Kid, one is Embarrassed.

blanket kid and embarrassed.

because the song is about liking-

wet dreams

liking a girl lah what the

i mean, blanket kid and embarrassed, both of them got no link you know

not really, eh i show you this

you’ve been showing me a lot of things

aiya i rest time, if not i do work already

what time you start work

soon

haa what time you wake up today sia

supposed to be 7

7? you know i don’t wake up so early for school.

<i woke up at like almost 10>

i wake up at like 8. nowadays i wake up at 8:05, 8:10. eheheh then ah at least you woke up at 10, i woke up at 11

-more irrelevant chinese-

i’m gonna be blind for like a good 20 minutes

i wanted to show you eh

what you want me to show me

stage presence, vely good.

actually the same, it’s the same song as just now, eh? ya its the same song as just now

the blanket kid song?

nonono, the first one i show you. but his stage presence so good. oh wait, then i should show you the other one. have i shown you this? i think i show mama already. this- i won’t show you the 6-minute one ah. just the-

i don’t have the stamina to watch korean thing like that

it has a storyline

eh i have not watch yesterday the taiwan show eh. what did i miss ah

i dunno i never watch

harh, you never watch? why you never watch. is this a real museum in korea?

fake one

that was what i was thinking, it’s too much western influence.

<but very elaborate ya. it’s very elaborate their sets>

too much. it’s too much ancient…references.

wah the shirt collar nice eh

it’s all Gucci, they’re dressed all in Gucci

are you serious?!

very high budget this one

wah they buy ah

mm

so much money ah

they buy. after that, all the things give them

HWWAAH

i like this colour party a lot

you know, korean guy’s lips look like girl’s lips, you know. i swear.

stop it.

i mean, if you cover, you cover their hair right. you cover their eyes sometimes right. you look at the bottom of their face right, then you’ll be like, is that a girl? there there there, see see. see see. he cover himself already.

stop

*sigh* oh shit that room looks cool. who’s your favourite one?

not yet.

that guy looks chinese though

this?

ya.

he is damn smart. 1% in korea

huh 1% in korea?

top 1%

are you serious?!

the kind of lyrics he writes for songs very good one. it’s very- like mind, mind-provocative.

mind-provoking. wait, so that guy is your favourite?

this one ah, ya. he’s actually DAMN good-looking.

is he the leader?

no

this one right

ya just now. he’s the second youngest. this is the youngest

oh

he’s one year older than me only eh

HUH one year older than you, younger than me?

ya

are they talking about money

want it more more more. won hei is more

orh

money money is more. won hei money money

i thought like. qian

no, actually before the thing came out everybody thought it was money

i want yo money money

then this is the

but sounds very indian inspired, you know like the way they say it want yo money money

no it’s from the bo, bo something trap some

what is bo something track

aiya i don’t know, but they say it’s damn, it’s damn popular now in the states and stuff, that’s why they came up with this kind of song

ya it’s the- it sounds very american song

trap, ya trap

wah their set is really very elaborate eh. what the hell that dance move. where’s your favourite

you know this two they bring up right, it’s legit the set is really two storeys one eh

are you serious?!

ya

and then can open up to this?

uh no

<oh that one is camera play>

i’m not talking about that. but then. but then the height right, he really have to jump down eh.

i want take more more more more more more AHAH. what do they want more? so has your korean improved listening to all these. and learning all the lyrics.

improve by lyrics ah, not really. my korean don’t improve by lyrics but by

watching drama

watching drama and reading korean

oh so you can read korean already ah, i didn’t know that

no…um i only can recognise some words only that’s all

in uni ah, take korean mod in uni. but you have to be prepared to like S/U it.

this is real also eh, even all the pipes is real.

are you serious?!

he say he went in and then he zhuanggdao, damn funny. actually everything in this video has symbolism one eh.

so what’s the pipes supposed to symbolise?

uh i don’t know about that

then?

then the rest, like the um the things, the props they use all got symbolism

then why they have the pietta prop. I mean why do they have the pietta sculpture.

this is- dunno lah. watch

you don’t know then you tell me

just watch

this is damn absurd

damn hungry already sia. what, he kiss the angel. HUUH then the angel become real

fake laaah

no as in, i’m asking if the, after that

no

why would he be kissing a sculpture angel

it’s all symbolism, there’s a story behind this

what, kiss then the michaelangelo one is it: he will let the angels out of the marbles

no, eh watch

A MONEYMONEY…that’s damn creepy. there, this is the pietta sculpture. not this, as in just now the

<it’s not>

the virgin mary holding babe jesus

even that thing on top the line, the words on top got symbolism. everything has symbolism though.

but too much, too much visual. too much visual story that’s not strong on it’s own, you know what i mean?

it’s based on a book, that’s why.

a korean book lah

no, it has, it’s english book. okay, time to go.

have to go what?

prepare, excuse me.

prepare what, where are you going? you need anything from art friend or not? i’m going art friend again, next week

hm?

i’m going art friend next week

next week?

ya where you going? why you leaving the room? ORH oh cos you going to cut hair i forgot eheh

 

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ARTIST RESEARCH – APICHATPONG WEERSAETHAKUL

Uncle Boon Me Who Can Recall His Past Lives (2010)

Watched this full film in class(notes and pointers I jotted down is in the other OSS post). Overall, I understand the broad storyline, but some parts of the story I don’t know what’s going on, especially with the relatively jarring addition of photos in between. Despite that, the photo element is quite interesting.

 

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Hence for the “final video” I’ve took elements from the masters.

On top of the video of my sister studying, I have an overlay of the conversation I had with my sister that is handwritten. Why handwritten and not just typing it out which is easier? Personally, I strongly feel that we should always write instead of type to show sincerity. I believe in handwriting letter than typing them as it is more raw and full of one’s own flair and character. It gives it a more personal type. Hence my decision to painstakingly write out everything before I take photos of them and overlaying on top of the video. This component is inspired by the way Mona Hatoum overlays the letters her mum wrote on top of the video of her bathing.

At the end of the video, I ended it by adding snapshots of me and my sister together. This component is inspired by Apichatpong. I place the pictures in chronological order, from the earliest to the latest. They are all of special memories. 2002 family excursion to an orchid garden, ?? science museum, 2013 after my last Chinese dance concert with NAFA, 2016 polaroid with my sister. In a way, as a reconciliation that despite how far I feel that I’ve grown from my sister, we are still sisters, we have many strong and fond memories to look back to.

 

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For the final video, I’ve chosen to use frontal close-up view of my sister studying. It has a better view of my sister studying, in that you can see her hands moving across the paper. Half her face is shown most of the time, with the other hand, showing how she is very focused on her task at hand, while giving it a slight mysterious edge.

 

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Why did I choose to overlay the video of my sister studying with pictures of handwritten text of the conversation instead of just including the sound clip? I felt that by rewriting, it is a form of going back through the conversation that we had and reflecting and internalizing it.

In addition, I’m cool with misspellings and cancellations across the paper. I feel that it does not have to be perfect. We normally have some mistakes, we just acknowledge, redo or correct it and carry on. Which has some parallels!

 

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Different Handwritten Text Format Tryouts

I tried out writing on a plain piece of paper.

I tried writing on foolscap paper. I quite like this as it sort of draws parallels to my sister studying as she is seen writing on one in the video. And it’s quite universal that students use foolscap as their main writing pad.

 

I couldn’t really decide which was better hence I input it into Premiere Pro to try out and then decide.

Foolscap Opaque Overlap

Foolscape 75% Opacity Overlap

Foolscap 60% Opacity Overlap

Plain Paper Opaque Overlap

Plain Paper 70% Overlap

Plain Paper 100% Opacity Blending Mode: Overlay

My favourite 2 ones are the Foolscap 70% Opacity Overlap and Plain Paper 100% Opacity Overlay Blending Mode. The former is because I feel that it ties with the whole studying idea + letter. The latter is because the background mostly blends away with the video of my sister. Some of the words can be seen while others not, which makes it quite hard to read yet mysterious. I mean, technically, relationships are a very private thing, you won’t want to share everyyything right.

 

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Pre-Final Video

So I did a video of whatever I mentioned above. This was intended to be my final video. After completing it, I feel very unhappy about it. It doesn’t really convey what I wanted in an interesting and provoking manner. So yep gonna try again SIGH. (Premiere Pro is a chore I swear.)

 

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FINAL VIDEO

Instead, I decided to swap out the overlay of text for a more simple and “rustic” plain voice recording of our interaction/conversation during her study break.

 

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50 Word Write Up

Mei. Are you there?
Mei. I’ve missed you.
Mei. Do you know how much I missed you?
Mei. Don’t push me away.
Mei. There’s so much to share with you.
Mei. Work hard. And come back to me.
Mei. I love you, don’t ever forget that.

My Preliminary Idea –
How I’m linking this new project with the last is that…

In the first project, I explored the relatively “outer sphere” in communication through the use of payphones, since one party would definitely be outside of the house, while the other may or may not be in public.
Instead of that, I wish to explore the opposite in this assignment. Looking towards “inner” communication, communication in a more personal space such as within a house. As they say, you don’t hang your dirty laundry outside(with reference to your anger/issues with certain family members outside, but you can voice out your entire feelings at home). Hence I decided to concentrate on communication between people within the confines of a home.

When we think of communication within a home, the most common place would be in the living room(I assumed that the dining room is part of the living room as that is the case for many HDB dwellers). Within this space, where would most communication happen? Most likely the dining table, maybe the sofa. That’s about it.

First, looking at the idea of the dining table. I originally thought of photographing people at the table eating and chatting. However, I thought that it was too literal. It would also look very posed as the family would be very aware of my presence or the presence of the camera staring at them snapping away as they eat and hence would be uneasy and unnatural.

The next idea I thought of was to photograph the dishes they had for dinner. This is a more subtle approach of tackling

 

 

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Ikea magazine
Cube magazine

TRYOUTS FOR IKEA MAG

 

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ARTIST REFERENCE – BRITTNEY PANDA

 

She goes by her pseudonym Brittney Panda and uploads her images onto Instagram. What I like about her work is the sense of ethereal and strong presence. Her trademark is that she takes most of her photographs in abandoned houses or forests, with herself being featured, but you can never see her face. She then creates a very powerful narrative. I learnt that you do not need facial expressions to create strong moods. In a sense, for me, without having the faces appearing, our usual focus of looking at the person’s face is now redirected at the scene and it’s atmosphere, and how the artist’s body inside enhances that narrative.

 

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ARTIST RESEARCH – TAMAE IWASAKI & EITARO OGAWA

https://www.facebook.com/todayonline/videos/vb.147858757571/10154102223292572/?type=2&theater

I came across a Facebook post by the TodayOnline, featuring a video about this Japanese couple living in Singapore who have published a book. It starts of with them being apprehensive of living in a HDB flat as their original perception of it was that it was a bore, living in units that were the same row after row, block after block. (Which I guess is a stark contrast to housing in Japan where it is very common for them to buy over a building unit, demolish it entirely and rebuild it again to add their own interior design ideas and flair.) When they got invited to a friend’s place did they realize you can put a lot of your own personal character into the place hence they started their project knocking onto stranger’s doors to ask to photograph their homes. According to them, the residents were mostly very nice and welcoming, even bringing them to the hawker centres to show them around their favourite and best Singaporean food available. However, I highly doubt it will work the same way with me as they have distinctively foreign accents, and Singaporeans are generally less weary of Japan “tourists” than a Singaporean girl knocking on their door asking to take photos of their house.

 

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SOFAS OF PPL
-Pictures I received
-Pictures I couldn’t use
–> They were too low resolution or pixelated when they were sent to me. (And’s)
–> The sofas were too zoom in and cropped, since I have already decided to go with the full sofa image and not just a cropped section of the sofa (Nad’s)
–> I really loved this photo in that there is a sofa present behind all the neat clutter. However, I feel that it’s too stark a contrast with the rest of the photos. Especially when the sofa really cannot be found even after close inspection. (Abi’s)

 

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TREATMENT OF PHOTOS (PROCESS)
As I did not take the photos, I do not have immediate first hand control in how I want my pictures to look like in a certain format.
I did give my participants a brief to follow
– frontal center point of view
– full image of the sofa
– email the full resolution

Assuming that they followed the 3 main point instructions above. There were 2 main problems I encountered. Firstly, the sofa’s were straight, most were slanted hence I had to photoshop the photo to tilt it till it was more or less horizontal. Secondly, due to the different dimensions of photos, due to different phone and camera configurations, I photoshopped all the photos to fit into a A4 paper. This meant I had to be selective on which parts to keep and which to discard. I also used the clone tool to clone certain areas of the background as I couldn’t enlarge the photo to fit the A4 sizing if not significant parts of the sofa would be cropped out.

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THINKING ABOUT FINAL LAYOUT
For my first project, I printed my photos in passport size photos (1″ x 2″) hence they can be said to be really unconventionally small for photos being put up in an exhibition. It had it’s own meaning whereby I wanted to force the audience to step closer to the piece so that they can interact with the subject matter. This created an intimacy through tension.

However, in this piece, I don’t feel that the earlier approach would fit as in ___________. Instead, I feel that by blowing up the size of the image would I get my intended message across. Here, the emptiness is in your face. The sofas are all shown from a frontal point of view, all of which are taken from the center. They take up most of the image. This forces us to come to terms with this subject matter blatantly placed in front of us. Our eyes would observe this lingering presence left behind by someone who once occupied it – creases on the sofa seat, clothes strewn over, pillows flopped over etc.

The background further gives us a slight insight to the lives of these people.

Also, since these photos are sent to me by the respective people living in the homes, the dimensions it came to me were all different. Some photos were longer, others were wider. Thus I cropped all the photos into the same size so there is a subtle sense of unity across instead of it being a very messy array of varying sizes.

I also encountered the problem of the photos being too pixelated when I blew them up to print. Since I didn’t have control over the size of the image as I had no choice but to leave that to the people residing in those homes(although I did specify to send in full resolution, but I am aware a camera’s resolution is almost always not as good as a DSLR’s).

 

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CHOSEN FINAL LAYOUT

I chose to print on A3 sized 190gsm art card as I wanted a large size but I really couldn’t afford any size bigger (the bill came to $62, byebye pocket money)

Documentary like. Somewhat similar to a catalogue, yet it does not have the pristine quality.

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ARTIST STATEMENT – SO CLOSE, SO FAR

The series of photographs aims to confront the viewer with the lack of physical human presence upon a subject matter (sofa) that we usually associate with people as a place of communication and interaction – the heart of the house apart from the dining table. Even though some of them have remnants of being occupied by belongings, is it a mere dumping ground for our items or do we actually use the space for meaningful communications?

 

(the title is a play on the word sofa if you haven’t notice)

15 August 2016
Relationships
Distance/displacement

Why are relationships so fleeting? So brittle? So often “non-existent”?

We see each other around and we often go
EHHH HELLO, HOW ARE YOU?!!!!!!
But the conversation often quickly ends with Good. You? Eh, I got to go busy, catch up with you soon.
But soon never ever comes.

And it’s this distance I hope to explore next. How people view themselves as “with a relationship(any kind – platonic) with someone, when in actual fact, is there really?

I’m not quite sure, but maybe also how technology shapes relationships. For instance Whatsapp, Pokemon Go(Dating Go LOL).

During lesson, I shared my idea. I said I would try taking photos of my mum calling me. No comments were given since I was last to present and that the class was running late already.

 

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22 August 2016
With the rushed encouragement, I looked towards how my mother communicates with me. Since I’m living in hall now, my mum would call very often to check how I am doing. It is as if she is trying to bridge the relationship that has grown further apart due to distance(yes despite in small small Singapore). I explored the idea of her calling me, by taking pictures of her calling me using the payphone. She often calls me using the payphone at the foot of a neighbouring block on her way to the market. Hence the payphone is a significant “tool” and not just an object I anyhow chose, for instance instead of a handphone. My mum rarely uses her phone too.

Even then, the calls are brief as I’m so busy and caught up with things to spend more than 5 mins talking to her. It’s quite sad and pathetic of me actually. Hence there is this sense of ephemerality.

Below are some of the photos I took for the sharing session. I have also included a few more that I didn’t show the class so that the narration flows better.

 

Personal reflections:
The linear narration of the photos look very short. It’s just pick up phone, talk, put down the phone. The narrative is very short and documentary like. Also, I don’t like how the ‘picking up the phone’ scene looks like the ‘putting down the phone’ scene. (I didn’t include that above as I didn’t present it in class but I did take photos of it) So I’m feeling quite stuck here.

 

Teacher and classmates comments:
– Usually it’s the older people using the payphone. And it is usually them trying to initiate conversation. Probably can take photos of them using the payphone.
– Try finding many payphones, people using them. Take photos. Talk to them and take notes. Something along the lines of Humans of New York.
– I mentioned that my mum calls me at different times throughout the day. The idea of showing the different times of the day she calls me through changes in clothes and props. For instance in the afternoon is bright and there is a shopping trolley beside.
– 10 cents for 3 mins. That’s a very short time – also precious time. What can you say within these few minutes?
– It is quite weird that I’m taking photos of my mother when she is calling me. Ask my sister to take photo of my mum when she calls me on the payphone. Kinda like the work The Shadow by Sophie Calle whereby she got her mother help hire a P.I. to follow Calle and Calle hired another P.I. to follow the first P.I.
– Communication is 2 way. Feels lonely if you only take one side. Take a photo of myself when I’m on the phone with mummy. Then lay these two photos side by side.
– Fleeting communication. Our phone calls usually last less than 5 mins hence it can be an idea to record the conversation. Put it as a text beside the photo. Like how Sophie Calle does it too. Gives the audience a greater idea that I’m talking about fleeting communication.

 

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29 August 2016
Following up on the class’s comments(the next two):

Some conversations I have with my mum – that often short (less than 5 minutes) hence it show the fleetingness of relationships:
– “Hello? Are you on the train yet?” “Yea.” “Was he there already?” “Yea.” “Why are you talking like that.” “I’m busy doing homework.” -hangs up-
– “Hello, have you eaten dinner yet?” “Yea. I ate liao.” “Who did you eat it with, him ah?” “No, he working today, I ate alone.” “sigh. Hurry up finish your work and go sleep earlier.” “Cannot, got lots of work today, I rushing homework now.” “Okay hurry okay, good nights” “Nights mummy.” -hangs up-
– “Hello?” “Hello, hi mummy. I talk to you later okay? I rushing to bathe, got the empty good empty cubical!” “Okay bye, sleep early horh. Call me before you sleep.” “okays can, bye.” -hangs up- (doesn’t call back too)
-Recurring theme of care and wanting to know more of my day – being closer? Especially poignant idea of wanting to be closer and connecting even though we’re physically far apart: Don’t sleep too late?, Have you eaten dinner?, How’s your day?, How’s school?

 

Research on Sophie Calle’s works to get some inspirations for my work:
– pictures and thoughts

 

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Calling with mobile phones – teenagers calling a rare phenomenon

– I asked my sister to pretend as if she was calling someone on her mobile phone. I felt that in the following images that she was quite fake and uneasy looking. Possibly due to it being not natural for her to make calls, as she really does not make any phone calls. She hates calling. Like very much and I’m not kidding. She would always redirect you to drop her a text instead.

 

Why I decide to abandon the exploration of mobile phones:
I felt that mobile phones are quite insincere. They are too common and in your face – lame even. I think I prefer a more subtle approach to it. Whereby I approach the issue of human relationships from a non

 

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Hunting Down Payphones, Events & Thoughts

I basically took 4 types of layouts, 1. Close up of the payphone in a straight-on manner, 2. Slightly further away from the payphone still in a straight-on manner, 3. The payphone(s) in it’s immediate surrounding to give a feel of where it’s situated and what are people’s reaction to it if any, 4. The payphone with people using it.

Number the sequence of places went and upload the photos for it.
1. IKEA Alexander
2. Beside NTU Giant & 7-11
3. Blk 964 Jurong West St 91
4. Blk 959 Jurong West St 91
5. Pioneer MRT
6. Toa Payoh MRT
7. Blk 190 Toa Payoh Lorong 6
8. Blk 183 Toa Payoh Central (near zebra crossing)
9. Blk 183 Toa Payoh Central Lift Lobby H
10. Blk 183 Toa Payoh Central Lobby E
11. Blk 178 Toa Payoh Central Beside Bata
12. Blk 179 Toa Payoh Central
13. Blk 998 Braddell Road Factory
14. Blk 205 Toa Payoh
15. Blk 109 Toa Payoh Lorong 1
16. Braddell MRT
17. Blk 126 Toa Payoh Lorong 1
18. Blk 128 Toa Payoh Loring 1
19. Blk 546 Woodlands
20. Vista Point Near Kopitiam
21. Vista Point Near Gian Supermarket

– talk about any funny experience felt or any story behind it:

-At Blk 959, the payphone beside Best coffeeshop, I saw this Chinese uncle in blue using the phone. I tried to be inconspicuous in taking photos of him using the phone, and since he was my first subject using the payphone, I was very nervous and excited. I walked around a bit in 360 degrees shooting random buildings and surroundings to try to make it less obvious that I was interested in him. He obviously noticed me and wasn’t happy about it. He tried turning his back towards me or at an angle from where I was that made the photos turn out as if he was standing near the payphone but not using it, which was not what I wanted. He started getting grumpy. And this Chinese auntie(at first I thought she was an uncle) in red, who I assume is his friend, has been eyeing me for a while, stood up from the bench nearby, walked in between me and the camera to shield him completely. It was quite obvious from body language and unhappy grunts that they were unhappy with my actions.

– At Toa Payoh MRT, I was photographing the payphone on the left out of 3 in a cluster. To my amazement, an old Chinese uncle just walked up calmly to the one right beside me and picked up the receiver. He pushed the coin in and said “我要一包horfun和一包yeemin。” – Which translates to: I would like to order one packet of horfun takeaway and another packet of yeemin takeaway. He then puts down the receiver and walks away.

– At the payphone at Blk 178 lift lobby E, there was a lady giving out flyers who was originally perching on her chair that was placed right beside the payphone. Upon realizing that I was taking photo of her there and the payphone, she got up and swiftly moved away. Standing far from me, she constantly moved, probably not wanting her picture to be taken.

– While photographing the red payphone near Bata shoe shop, there was this old Indian auntie pushing a red grocery shopping cart. I heard a loud clank, and through the corner of my eye I saw her shuffling past the black payphone to my right. Only after about 2 mins later did I realize that she must have been trying her luck/looking for small change in the change release slot. I just felt bad for her.

 

Feelings about asking ppl – cannot bring myself to do it. Especially after the first guy at best coffee shop scared me. – The humans of NY style won’t work sadly ):

 

I did mini experiments by lifting up the receiver and watching the different changes on the screen. This one in particular shows the common countries to call and the numbers to add before dialing. Which I think is useful as the caller ID sheet is quite a lot higher than a normal height person reads.

 

Different phones – different call duration with same amount of money
Test calling with the red-white payphone(Blk 178 TPY):


Test calling with the black payphone(Blk 179 TPY):
The red-white phones had a total call time of 2 mins for 10cents, whereas the black phones had a total call time of 3 mins for 10 cents. I feel that 10cents for 3 mins is really cheap!!
– This could be different suppliers having different regulations.

When testing the black payphone at Blk 183 Toa Payoh central for the money to limit of call duration, it had a call number appear on the handphone instead of the usual “blocked”. Being all excited, I tried calling back that number to see what would happen. Will the public phone ring? Sadly it didn’t. The screeen lit up and stated “phone busy”, even after I hung up my mobile phone side. It just continued like this for 2mins, even when I lifted up the receiver and placed it back down in a bid to restart it.

 

Analysing components of the phone:
What makes an effective means of communication? The components that make up the vessel of communication.
The overall design of payphones does vary, however, the individual components are roughly the same. A parallel that even though every relationship is very different but are essentially the same when it boils down to the fundamentals for instance, care, concern, effort.

 

 

Trend:
I notice that at the general same area, the same kind of phones are installed.
– Toa Payoh and Braddell: red-white and black
– Woodlands: red-yellow and red-white
– Pioneer: red-white
That being said, I mainly went to these 3 general areas only, so it may not be a good representation of Singapore as a whole. But it shows you a rough idea of how which payphone supplier has a stronghold over a certain area.

 

Top Up Machine
Found a top up machine at Blk 206 in Toa Payoh. It was quite cute lol.
Parallel that we have to make effort in connecting to one another, if you don’t put in, no one will ever receive and the chance of holding on to the relationship or reconnecting with one another is slim.

 

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Self Portraits? Relationship Portraits?

I had a revelation that throughout this journey, I was in a way documenting indirect self portraits or indirect relationship portraits. There are generally 3 kinds of self portraits, direct self portrait – which almost uses a frontal imagery of the person, indirect self portrait using objects, often personal, to depict/tell a story of the person and lastly indirect self portrait with a reflection of the person on the object.

This was definitely a indirect self portrait, or even indirect self portrait with a reflection of the person on the object. It is the latter as you can see the reflection of my legs in the reflective metal piece at the bottom of the payphone, and sometimes a reflection of my camera on the top half of the payphone. It irked me a lot at first that I couldn’t take pristine photos devoid of people. But I realized that that wasn’t my point. My point is someone trying to connect this fleeting almost non-existent relationship. There is someone, hence presence, making the effort. Whether or not the other person responds to the initiation is a different matter. It is an indirect portrait that converted a public subject matter(public payphones) into something very intimate and personal within the short call duration time frame.

 

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Presentation Layout Ideas

– People on the payphone photo on the left and their respective interview transcript on the right. Mimic Humans of New York style. A good thing about this layout is that it is very clear in providing information to the viewer. Visually, we know that the left pictorial corresponds to the right, with the text providing further insights of what’s going on in the picture. The following are some screenshot examples I took off Humans of NY’s Instagram page. (All credits to Brandon)

He continues using this style even in his books (hence it can’t really be said that the above layout was because of Instagram default layout settings). He carefully selects interesting parts or even mundane things in his interview/conversations with strangers and pairs it up with his pictures.

This idea was sadly scraped as I was too uncomfortable to approach strangers to ask them why the choice of using a payphone instead of their mobile phone, who are they calling, and what’s the relationship like with that person.

 

– using photos that show the payphones in their environment
As mentioned earlier, as I went around hunting for payphones, apart from capturing the payphone itself, I also took it in it’s surroundings. I found it amazing and intriguing how they seem to be juxtaposed in a space, sometimes blending in to the surroundings(due to colour) or standing out, yet no one notices it and walks by as if nothing was there. I want to give the idea of coldness in these pictures.

– small phone booth photos in passport size placed side by side. WHY passport photo size.

 

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Reflection:

I learnt to be more aware of my surroundings, both the people and places.

Looking for payphones was hard as they are not common in Singapore anymore (I was hoping to find the iconic orange one, but to no avail).

I spent a lot of time walking around, staring intently at walls and walkways. And through this I was forced to notice other things like signboards, pipes and letterboxes – things that we normally ignore naturally. I also become more aware of people, their curious or annoyed piercing stares on me taking photos of people/themselves using payphones or the payphone itself (like seriously ah girl why are you taking that?! Is it that interesting?! – and it felt very very uncomfortable with them staring/glaring at me) or how inconsiderate some people can get when they clearly see you taking photos from a distance but still decide to walk right in front of your camera lens when you press the shutter. Maybe even then, I’m assuming they say and processed in their mind that I was taking photos, it may be like how we often only “see what’s important” to us and ignore all other visual information.

At first I was very apprehensive about taking photos of strangers using the phone. What if they see me and get unhappy(which my first stranger payphone user did). So I came out with methods like taking photos of the surroundings a bit first and not aiming at the payphone. I’ll do a 360 degrees photo taking session manner till I reach the payphone subject matter. This helped in building confidence. After a while, I just snapped away, and if I felt unsafe/uncomfortable, I would walk further away.

I wished I was able to muster up the courage to talk to strangers, it’s such a daunting thought and task. I felt really uncomfortable. But better insights could have been gained and added into this assignment, so it’s quite a shame, and I’m disappointed in myself.

I also felt quite frustrated about my composition. I wanted to frame all my payphones in such a way that they would take the same proportion of space in the paper size so that they look like a uniform documentary. This was hard as the red payphone was shaped vastly different from the black ones – red being shorter and a wider. Hence the positive and negative space differed a lot.

 

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Artist Statement

I’m interested in relationships and how fleeting they seem in present times. How often do we really keep in touch with others and know about their lives in-depth? This particular concept sparked and caught my interest during a time where I was doing a lot of self-reflection regarding my relationships with my friends and family, and how they all seem quite non-existent, especially so for my friends in particular. I remember I used to be the one asking people out to meet and to catch up. Yet, after multiple empty promises and even rejections, I stopped putting in the effort altogether. Eventually I started seeing parallels to this with regards to my family relationships. In a way, I’m pushing them further away from me as I use reasons (or excuses) like being overwhelmed with schoolwork to keep conversations invariably short.

The choice of doing a documentary style, photo after photo of zoomed-in frontal view shots of payphones, was to make it devoid of emotions, to make it empty. In a way, this reflects the nature of many of our relationships: drained and empty. It also serves to make the viewer come face to face with the subject and reckon with its presence. There is a sense of irony, as we often walk past these payphones and not give two hoots about it or even notice that they are there. In addition, I chose to print them in passport sizes, to draw parallels to passport photo portraits, which are often very intimate belongings that we rarely want to show openly. Furthermore, due to their small size, it forces the viewer to come forward to view and scrutinize the payphone, creating a sort of tension.

 

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Revised Artist Statement

Through the process of looking out for these payphones, it struck me how obscure and forgotten these machines were. It was almost as if they were relics of a time long past. And the only people who seemed to use them were remnants from that same time: a time when a phone call was the fastest way to reach someone distant. In today’s age of mobile phones, a phone call is an anomaly, text messages having replaced them as the most popular means of communication. Communicating via voice seems almost as archaic as these forgotten artifacts that I have photographed. The elements of expression in one’s voice: tone, pitch, volume, and accent, have been replaced with emojis and acronyms. I feel that this development of technology has taken away that element of humanity from our long-distance communications. Genuine communication has become lost to history, just as these payphones have.

 

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Presentation of Artwork – Hung Up

35 photographs of payphones
1″ x 2″ each