I went to FrenchMottershead talk about their latest project commissioned by The Photographers’ Gallery – they are working with residents of Soho to highlight the pleasures and challenges of living in this compact area of Central London.
Rebecca and Andrew shared their strategies for engaging residents of Soho. Strategies used by the artists range from hand written postcards inserted into postal boxes of people living in the area, mobile phone picture sharing, to meeting people on street or by the gate of the local school, attending local resident’s meetings, inserting adverts into local newspapers, drinking teas and eating biscuits with strangers and being given phone numbers for people their should meet by the people who they have just met.
The artists openly shared their working process and ups and downs of the work created with community. They emphasised the importance of live event that is usually present in their work. The social aspect of the live moment, ‘togetherness’ is for the artists a critical element. However the importance of ‘final’ outcome of the project – in this case photographs – and quality of it has also been raised. During this commission FrenchMottershead are going to be working with a professional photographer, to ensure high quality of final photographs.
When asked about the methodology that is closest to their way of working, the artists distanced themselves from the ongoing theoretical debates surrounding shared/ engaged / relational ways of working. And said: ‘we use very practical methodology’ and mentioned Stephen Willats’ work as a reference.
The final work will be available on The Photographers’ Gallery website.
More about the project:
http://www.photonet.org.uk/index.php?pvid=1251
More about the artists:
http://www.frenchmottershead.com/
And if you have a minute visit Stephen Willats show at Chelsea Space before 9th April.
