INSPIRATION
LAST RESORT Last Resort is a 2000 film directed by Paweł Pawlikowski. It tells the story of a Russian woman and her son who arrive in London, expecting to be met by her fiancÊ. When he does not arrive, they claim asylum, and are confined to a small seaside town while their claim is considered. Margate doubled as the fictional seaside town of Stonehaven, and was the setting for the majority of the film. The film was inspiring to me as it captures the gritty realism of seaside towns. It is very visually apealing to me as it captures a feeling of familiarity mixed with bleakness.
MARTIN PARR Martin Parr is a British documentary photographer and photojournalist. He is known for his photographic projects that take an intimate, satirical look at aspects of modern life, in particular documenting the social classes of England. A large section of his work focusses on the British seaside holiday. His unflinching look at the working-class experience inspired my work. For some, his photographs might look depressing or even shocking, but to me they are quite nostalgic. He captures the mixture of depression and humour that I am aiming for in my project.
HANNAH BLACKMORE Hannah Blackmore is a British photographer. Vacant is a series of photographs of empty, closed-down and abandoned shop fronts from Blackmore’s home towns of Margate, Ramsgate and Cliftonville. The images capture a moment in time and they have a sadness about them that intrigues me. Borded up shops like this are a common sight in Sandown, and I would like my final piece to include these in some way.
THE WONDERLAND ARCADE from Retronaut. A set of photographs of the interior of Wonderland Arcade, 12th and Grand, Kansas City, Missouri. The pictures were taken as evidence in a federal case brought against the arcade related to taxation of its penny bingo games. What is inspiring to me about these photos is the colour pallete. there are some elements that i would like to encorporate into my compositions, for instance the flags on the ceiling.
JACK HURLEY Jack Hurley is an illustrator who makes comical versions of the classic railway posters. I think they encapsulate the common understanding of depressing seaside towns. They play on the idea of towns as idealistic holiday resorts as they were typically depicted in advatising, subverting this notion to create anti-advatisements. This idea of the ‘rubbishness’ of seaide towns is somthing that I hope to portray in my work.
WILLIAM GOLDSMITH: VIGNETTES OF YSTOV Vignettes of Ystov is a Graphic novel set in the Fictional soviet era Eastern-European town of Ystov. The stories document the lives of a series of characters. I enjoy the way the story puts the reader in the perspective of a spectator who is casually wondering in and out of the lives of the characters. I would like to include this type of spectatorship in my final piece in some form, perhaps by following some characters as they move about their lives.
NIALL MCDIRMID I find Niall Mcdirmid’s Photography to be transformative in a way. He seems to transform the dull, average subject matter into beautiful landscapes with his use of lighting and framing. In the image below, an otherwise boring shot of a cafe is turned into something beautiful.