Work in Progress... Phill Hopkins

Introducing... Johanna Hooson

Si : Hi Johanna, welcome to the blog. First off, could you tell us a bit about yourself?

Johanna: I am a photographer who lives and works in Leeds. I also work part-time as a Therapeutic Social Worker, mainly with children and young people post-abuse. In this role I help children make sense of their experiences and reframe their narratives into stories of survival and hope as well as acknowledging loss and pain. This idea of transformative stories has been important to me in preparing photographs for the stations of the cross exhibition. I have been looking at images of the cross and thinking about how an instrument of torture and death has become a symbol of hope and life.

Si : I love your photographs.... there's a sense of solitude in them, and a real stillness; there are no human figures in your work, yet there's a sense of human presence there somehow.

And there's a lovely melancholy about them too...

I'm wondering if that's just me projecting my own personality and interests onto the images, or if those are things that you're conscious of when you're making the work?

Johanna : That's interesting, people often say that I have a calm presence. I think it's a quality that helps in my therapeutic work, and perhaps it's something I create unconsciously in my photography too. I find that I need time away from people to rebalance my self, and you’re right, I don’t include people in my photographs generally, but I do like to photograph manmade structures and design, particularly everyday objects that tend to get overlooked, such as manhole covers, air-bricks, ridge tiles and telephone/electricity poles. I’m also drawn to things that are weathered or damaged, which makes them interesting to me, but perhaps also creates a sense of melancholy.  

Si : There's a lot of pattern in your work, and an interest in the shapes and spaces that exist between things. To the point where things become almost abstracted at times...

Johanna : Yes, I think this is partly due to some of my professional photography being used in cd artwork, so I have become conscious of needing to leave spaces for typography! But I am often more interested by pattern within something or in a collection of things, rather than depicting the whole. I feel more comfortable as an observer than a participant often, and my photographs are an extension of that. Perhaps because of this I see shape or patterns that others don’t notice. 

I often revisit favourite places again and again and take photographs of the same things which are transformed because of a different light/colour/weather. I also use depth of field, focus and framing to capture patterns and shapes that interest me. This can lead to abstraction! 

Si : I really like that idea of revisiting places and seeing the subtle differences - Jo Dunn has that same thing going on in her work I think...

I also love the idea of the Artist as someone who seeks out the stuff that other people miss...

I'd be interested too, to find out how your professional, commissioned photography work relates to the images that you make for yourself - whether or not there's a clear divide between the two? (And if so, how you approach to each type of work differs…)

Johanna: Yes, I love Jo Dunn’s series of paintings of Gledhow Valley Woods; the images of ‘condemned' trees with their yellow spots. As well as noticing and depicting things others may overlook, blemishes and anomalies add interest for me, whether they’re natural or created by people. 

There isn’t a clear divide in my work between the commissioned and the not. I tend to suggest a current obsession will work well! The only difference is, as I said earlier, I need to be more conscious of leaving some space for words, and imagining the proportions differently when I’m taking the shots, so that they will work as square images. When I’m taking photographs of anything that I think would work as a cd cover I tend to take some shots like this now anyway, just in case! Instagram has made many people rediscover the art of the square image, like the polaroid print. It changes your sense of composition.

Si: Finally, is there anywhere that we can go to see more of your work?

Johanna: Yes, I have a website, johannahooson.com. You can also find me beginning to use Instagram (constantagirl) and Facebook (Johanna Hooson, photographer).

Station 11

Jon Vogler's piece for the exhibition was installed in the church for a couple of days during Holy Week...

We're looking forward to seeing it back again at the end of the month...

Even more work in progress... Phill Hopkins

Introducing ... Iman Meghraoua

Si : Hi Iman, and welcome to the exhibition blog. Can I begin by asking you about the piece that you are making for the show?

Iman : I was inspired by Jesus' last station in the tomb. I chose natural materials that come from the earth to confirms the Muslim understanding of the human nature of prophet jesus(peace be upon him)

The tomb is made from mud (the mud-made bread oven is still used in the region) corresponding to the birth place of Jesus - Bethlehem - in Hebrew and Arabic - meaning House of bread : "I am the bread" say Jesus ....." In John 6:35  

Saying : " I am the word " of Jesus 

I tried representing it by carving it (just like the stone tablets of Moses) and I would be quoting a verse of Holy Quran - talking about the birth and death of the prophet  and confirming his immortality.

I also tried to represent the script of the Arabic text carved into plaster, using the Alhambra technique of carving because this style was used during the golden age of the three religions when all three religions lived in peace. 

Si : It's looking really good! I'm especially keen to see those plaster carvings - you often work with traditional Islamic calligraphy, text and pattern. I wonder if you could tell us a little more about that?

Iman: I have been studying fine arts for many years and I have finished with a distinction in the ÉCOLE DE APPLIQUE DUPPERE in Paris, but all of my inspiration has been linked with the designs and materials from the Earth; natural. I am really concerned about the modern disconnection of the natural world because this is where we come from and where we live. This is why I decided to study traditional arts & techniques because they are a base of thousands of years accumulated in wisdom; especially in sacred art - they have a divine signature of the universal order of nature and purity if the materials (using the materials of water, earth, stone, sand, wood and minerals).  The traditional scared arts ( calligraphy , manuscript , carving, ceramic, weaving....)have three principal forms. 

The most important one is Calligraphy - which is the word of  God- this is the revelation i.e. the holy Bible, Torah & the Quran. 

The second one is The arabesque. This represents the links in the natural world .

And the third one is Geometry ,which represents the universal order of nature. 

"We created all things in order" Quran : sura al Quamar :54:49

From the structure of the DNA to the structure of the orbiting planets; we understand the Divine matrix. And all three of these forms are linked in their perfect harmony.

The Islamic patterns are the symbolic of the central doctrine of Tawhid: the unity of the universe, the oneness of God. Making a union and making One. All of the human cultures use their patterns of this union. By repeating these patterns we are remembering this unity constantly. And for me, the disconnection of modern life reflects in the western expression of art where illness, frustration, stress and emotional discomfort are results of lost understanding of the natural way of living. I find the peace and harmony by studying the world of traditional sacred arts, where wisdom interlinked from all cultural traditions in unity. 

More Work in Progress... Phill Hopkins

[see also Phill's previous Work in Progress post...]

Work in Progress... Chloe Smith

"I’m going to print this pattern onto fabric for my stations of the cross project. My station is number 6 - Veronica wipes the face of Jesus. It feels symbolic to press my image onto fabric to represent this station.

I am not a Christian but my favourite part of Christian art is the symbolism -something equally prevalent in tattoo art. My bird and teardrop ‘tattoo design’ aims to marry the two.

  

I got slightly obsessed with tattoo iconography after reading about a tattoo stations project called Stations on the Skin: https://createvisualculture.wordpress.com/2012/02/01/cruciformity-stations-on-skin-the-designs-and-invite/ 

I read that wives of incarcerated husband’s would have teardrop tattoos to show their solidarity and loss. It seemed relevant for Veronica to have a teardrop tattoo on her face. She seems to me to represent all Christians in her actions and attitude towards Jesus’s journey with the cross and his suffering."