Roberta Murray | Rocky Mountain House, AB Canada
From a young age the medium of photography has fascinated me. The ability to manipulate the story by choosing what to show in the frame has made me think about reality and how our views are influenced through such manipulations. Society is continually being influenced on what to think, what to buy, or how to live their life through the biases of others; the media, entertainment, art, and even other people. How we share a story influences the decisions a person makes on a daily basis.
It is my experience as a fibre artist that has led me to this point in photography. I had one of those ‘ah ha’ moments while taking a fibre arts workshop on creativity. I realized the same principals of colour, texture and depth that are applied to textiles could be applied to images. To convey the idea of a hand, for example, does not mean a detailed realistic copy of a hand needs to be created in the textile work. Shape, colour, and texture could be used in such a way that the viewer understands the message is of a hand. I began to wonder if that same level of detail needed to be present in a photograph to tell a story.
While some painters have long strived to create a photo realistic style of painting, I am twisting it around in striving to create photographs that rival paintings. I am using the same techniques as the Pictorialist photographers of the late 1800’s and early 1900’s, in applying special lenses, textured papers, combining negatives, and/or darkroom manipulation to achieve a painterly or impressionistic style to many of my images.
The ability to change the use of a camera from a technical instrument into a paintbrush to illustrate the world in my own ‘words’, has inspired me to explore the world around me in a much more personal way. I am seeing new things; new layers of reality, which makes me look at what would normally be considered mundane or taken for granted, with new perspective. It is hoped that through these manipulations I can encourage people to question how their own personal perceptions influence their views of reality.
