Emma Walker
MA work
MA work
The Acts and Processes of Transformation
Info
Info
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MA Degree
School
School of Humanities
Programme
MA Photography, 2014
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Contact
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The natural world and my own particular experiences of the natural world are what, essentially, drive my personal and creative works. These works toy with the visualisation of traditional landscape concepts such as the sublime and transcendence, utilise the tropes of contemporary landscape photography and performance, such as the deadpan, yet ultimately draw attention to the often undervalued process of looking and searching.
Concepts such as place-attachment, biophilia, and the act of forest bathing form a foundation for my photographs, performances, and sculptures that in turn almost satirise these very notions. My practice involves the fictionalisation of these theories and concepts based upon, often personal, imagined desires, longings, and narratives, often using the veil of scientific truth and/ or the deceptive properties of the photograph.Â
The Acts and Processes of Transformation is part of an ongoing personal exploration into place-attachment and biophilic relationships between man and the land. The project is formed around the fictional phenomenon of transbiosphericmutation; where the human body, if desired, can transform and mutate into an alternative organism which contributes to the make up the natural landscape. Life and time as we understand them are paused in this state, as consciousness becomes obsolete, due to this irreversible transformation.
The project lies somewhere between photography and performance; the outcome is at times photographic documentations of ephemeral performances where I change the form of my body and merge with the landscape, yet at other times are single banal landscape images devoid of human presence. Neither presence nor absence is declared, what once was, or perceived to be, a human body becomes transmuted to the point where it is questionable as to whether it ever existed. The forms in the landscape become suggestive of human presence, seemingly out of place masses of foliage lead the viewer to become aware of the ambiguous nature of the work.
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Degrees
- Diploma in Acting, Liverpool Institute of Performing Arts (LIPA), 2008; BA (Hons) Photography, Arts University College Bournemouth, 2011
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Experience
- Freelance researcher and cataloguer, National Trust, 2013–14; Gallery assistant, Hamilton’s Gallery, Mayfair, 2012
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Exhibitions
- Splinter Art Fair, Michael Hoppen Gallery, London, 2013; Eureka photographer, Royal Institution, London, 2012; AOP student Photographer of the year, Hoxton Gallery, London, 2012; Formation, ‘Arbeit’ gallery, Brick Lane, London 2012; Once upon a wintertime: An immersive east London pop-up festival, Hackney, London, 2011; South West Photography Prize, The Create Place’ Bethnal Green, London, 2011; Candid Arts Trust annual photographic exhibition, Candid Arts Trust, London, 2011; Paradalia, Truman Brewery, London, 2011
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Awards
- Shortlisted, The Times Eureka Young Photographer, 2012; Shortlisted, AOP Student Photographer of the Year, 2012; Shortlisted, South West Photography Prize, 2011
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Publications
- Science & Fiction, Black Dog Publishing, 2014; The Times Eureka Magazine, 2012