Author: carlwhetham

Hannah Wilke

Another artist to use the narrative technique of photographic autopathography is Hannah Wilke. Whereas Spence’s work was concerned with reclaiming her body from the medical profession, Wilke’s photographs question conventional representations of female beauty in art and mass media. Continue reading “Hannah Wilke”

Bob Flanagan, Supermasochist

“In a bizarre alternative universe kind of way I sort of resemble Superman. . . . [D]espite my skinny physique and frail sensitivities, I possess certain powers and abilities far beyond those of so-called normal human beings. I was born with a genetic illness that I was supposed to succumb to at two, then ten, then twenty, and so on. But I didn’t. And, in a never-ending battle not just to survive but to subdue my stubborn disease, I’ve learned to fight sickness with sickness.” (Bob Flanagan, quoted in Kilpatrick 1998) Continue reading “Bob Flanagan, Supermasochist”

Tobin Siebers, My Withered Limb

This article is one of the most touching and brave explorations of disability I have read. Kudos to Siebers for having the courage to reveal himself in such an explicit way. Siebers suffered from the effects of polio as a child, resulting in a withered right leg. Continue reading “Tobin Siebers, My Withered Limb”

Marie Chouinard, “bODY_rEMIX / gOLDBERG_vARIATIONS”

I found this powerful performance through a link from a disability website. The work was originally created in 2005 for the Venice Biennale’s International Festival of Contemporary Dance. It is a mixture of dance and performance art, exploring the physicality of disability. Continue reading “Marie Chouinard, “bODY_rEMIX / gOLDBERG_vARIATIONS””

Project participants

All of the potential participants in the project I have met before and made contact with on numerous occasions. This makes the process much easier, since they already know me and I have established a rapport with them. This is probably the most important and time-consuming part of any humanist project, and one that deserves more attention. I have read or heard photographers talk about using their personality, and I really feel that a camera without a personality behind it is not able to get those intimate and captivating shots that so engage viewers. To hell with HCB and the decisive moment; if you’re working with people, you need to have a decent personality to begin with. I always start with the people, just talking to them. I take along a notebook and pencil to the preliminary meeting, but never a camera. I want them to identify with me first as a person, and later as a maker of pictures, in much the same way as I relate to them as people first, and then whatever later – be it artist, musician, actor or person with disability. Without the personal connection there is not much point to the exercise in my opinion. I made a long list and began to meet people from the disability centre ARDI, where we had made initial contact.

Reflections on and changes to project brief

The more I look at disability and the issues and discourse brought into focus by disabled artists themselves, the more the project is developing into a need to challenge stereotypes and present my subjects as people who are trying to lead normal existences despite their impairments, and despite societal barriers, rather than what I had first envisaged as a kind of collection of people who are achieving things beyond what the initial diagnosis had predicted for them. This may seem like a slight adjustment, but it is a huge political shift for me.

The Politics of Asking and the Myth of Informed Consent, Carolyn Anderson & Thomas W. Benson

Taken from Documentary Dilemmas: Frederick Wiseman’s Titicut Follies, 1991 Southern Illinois University Press. Fortunately, a large part of the chapter of this book that most interested me was available on Google books. Continue reading “The Politics of Asking and the Myth of Informed Consent, Carolyn Anderson & Thomas W. Benson”

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