five


  • Photographer
    Christopher Young
  • Prize
    Honorable Mention
  • Date of Photograph
    2008-2011

As children growing up, my brother, a friend and I used to play in an abandoned building. The different rooms contained objects that appealed to us and we gathered these trinkets to put them into the cleanest room, essentially creating a hideout. My work is very much about reading and activating spaces that have somehow been disconnected from society. What or who is not there? What can’t we see? How do we overcome the helplessness of not being able to ground an image? The images aim to exploit this helplessness to create a more visceral response to images.

Story

As young children growing up in small-town New Zealand, my brother, a friend and I used to play in an abandoned building. The different rooms were in varying states of disrepair, often containing objects that appealed to us. We gathered these trinkets and put them into the cleanest room, essentially creating a hideout.

Whilst the specific histories of places that I visit are, conceptually- and personally-speaking, irrelevant, there is a sympathy for that which is stagnant or neutered by external forces.

In contrast to urban exploration, which is often adrenaline-fuelled, my work is a formalised process and is more about reading and activating spaces that have somehow been disconnected from society.

I want my images to be less about specifics (ie. a school, a church, etc.) and more about universal experience. That is, what moves both the viewer and I without it being so much about the content imaged. Because of this, the images are highly ambiguous.

Typically I deliberately enter spaces with only a vague idea of what I am about to encounter. Any ambiguity in the resultant images should then enable a personalised reading by someone who views the work. This essentially replicates my original experience.

What or who is not there? What can’t we see? How do we overcome the helplessness of not being able to ground an image in a time line?

The images are an attempt to exploit this helplessness to create a more visceral, rather than intellectual, response to images.

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