Introducing Video of the Week from Wales Arts Review. We’ll be showcasing some of the best new art in Wales with a new video shared every week. From music to drama and everything in between, videos will not be limited by medium. Today we take a look at “UNSEEN” from photographer Suzie Larke.
This week we’re looking at a video from Cardiff photographer, Suzie Larke, on her latest project UNSEEN. Larke’s work – showing at The Southbank in London – explores mental health through fine art photography.
Larke’s photos use constructed imagery – where different photographs are digitally stitched together – to create a singular image intended to challenge notions of reality and its stability. This ‘magical realism’ technique is a part of the project’s overall aim to give visual expression to the inner struggle of mental illness, an experience that is often insular and unverbalised.
Larke says of the project:
“I’m interested in making images that challenge our notion of reality, exploring the interplay between the possible and impossible. I use constructed imagery, digitally stitching photographs together in such a way that they present as a single, untampered image.”
UNSEEN was created in collaboration with fifteen co-creators. The participants were given the chance to choose both the location and overall concept of their own image; Larke then used her artistry to help actualize each contributor’s idea and transform it into a single image.
The below video shows how Larke approached photographing her subjects, and some of the conversations she had with them surrounding their personal experience of mental health and its impact on their day-to-day life.
Learn more about Larke’s UNSEEN project in the video below.
UNSEEN is Part of the Southbank Centre’s Winter Light exhibition.
