Exploration of time through self-portraiture

Abstract

This practice-led research project titled ‘Exploration of Time through Self-Portraiture’ responds to passage of time on the self. Driven by creative practice, this research aims to address this question through a series of self-portraits that attempt to explore the nature of time on various levels. This research was conceived as a meditation on time and its largely unnoticeable impact on people occurring on a daily basis. People are only likely to notice the effects of time when it accumulates into months and years. Through a series of self-photographs taken throughout the day for a specific time period, the principal focus of this research is to explore the impact of time on one’s self through documentation and observation. Reference to philosophical theories put forward by Henri Bergson, Marianne Hirsch, Susan Sontag and Roland Barthes were employed to better understand the results emerging from this study. Dorothea Lange, Anne Leibovitz, Ai Wei Wei and Eadweard Muybridge were crucial references throughout this research. The dynamics of subject versus researcher/observer are also explored in this study, since the subject happens to also be the researcher/observer. This research project consists of a series of photographs spanning hours and days that depict slices of time, documented and presented to the viewer to discern how time’s impact might be un/noticeable. Care was taken to adhere to a particular aesthetic language when it came to shooting the photographs, with special attention devoted to composition and framing. The research project reflects on our daily routines that leave little time for introspection and observations of our surroundings. In partaking of this research project, one starts to realise just how little we might be aware of our ‘unconscious’ behaviours, especially when not around other people. The findings of this study help to shed light on the more hidden aspects of the mundane moments we might find ourselves in, without ever perhaps stopping to consider them.