About the project.
Hello Blaenavon!
I’ll be out and about Blaenavon with my camera tomorrow (Saturday 25 June) to celebrate World Heritage Day. I’ll be getting to know folk and looking for potential collaborators. Please say hello if you see me, I’m new in town. I’m almost 6ft tall with bright red hair, a big smile and a camera so you won’t miss me!
The project.
Over the next two months I propose to create series of large scale photographic portraits which reference the oil painting ‘Welsh Landscape with Two Women Knitting’ by William Dyce (1806 - 1864) held in National Museum Wales collection. see image below. The portraits shall be created within the local landscape in collaboration with members of the local community. I want to work with people from all walks of life. I’m particularly keen to meet people from the mining and iron works community.
I would like to use this artwork as a starting point as it draws parallels with my own heritage. The painting, is described as a celebration of Welsh rural life depicting two women in folk costume on a Snowdonia hillside. Dyce was, like myself, originally from Aberdeen, Scotland and came to Wales for his health and a change of air in 1860. The area immediately captivated the artist. I wish to question the romaticised view of this painting and hold a mirror up to The Valleys in 2011. Working in the Valleys and Blaenavon Industrial World Heritage Site I will integrate the roles of the community I collaborate with and re-stage this painting on several locations with different people to create a series of staged photographs depicting the community 2011. The painting was created in 1860, 20 years after the birth of photography, oil on millboard crates the look of a colour glossy photograph and the displacement of figures create an early day Photoshop of sorts.
Please spread the word!
http://www.visitblaenavon.co.uk/en/WorldHeritageSite/PressArea/NewsArticles/WorldHeritageWeekend2011.aspx
http://www.visitblaenavon.co.uk/en/WorldHeritageSite/WorldHeritageSite/Publications/WorldHeritageDay2011Programme.pdf
