The images shown
here were produced on an iPad as part of a little personal challenge, related
to the school field trip to Birmingham I accompanied a few weeks ago.
 |
| All Images: iPad Image, (Manipulated Photographs), June 2016 |
It’s one of the
paradoxical aspects of history that those who live through momentous change are
sometimes less aware of the drama of it all than those who rationalise accounts
of it from outside or after the event.
Individual lives tend to be lived on a domestic or routine basis, to a
day-to-day rhythm - rather than than in big chapters of underlined
significance. My formal education
sketched in the transformative upheavals of the Industrial Revolution, and even
some of the twentieth century turmoil that shaped the society we were born
into. However it’s easy to forget that
we are currently living through a period of possibly even greater societal,
environmental, and above all, technological transformation.
Don’t worry
though, I’m not about to embark on a major dissertation on the way digital
technology is altering all aspects of human life; but rather just a briefer
discussion of one new way it has recently touched on my own practice. To return to that original thought for a
moment though – it is now possible for those of us of ‘a certain age’, to
actually gain a little perspective on the massive changes that have occurred,
even over the few decades of our own span.
As a child, I
remember my father occasionally discussing ‘The Machine Room’ at the local Bank
where he worked. It was, I like to
imagine, a room occupied by one or two primitive calculating engines - possibly
housed in wardrobe-sized cabinets, not unlike those employed by archetypal Bond
villains in their flip-top volcanoes [1.]. I also remember, at the age of seven,
watching grainy monochrome footage of Neil Amstrong fluffing his lines and
bouncing around on the Moon, - his ever utterance punctuated by an electronic
‘bleep’. Journalists and Historians
never tire of telling us how the computing power harnessed in that achievement
was no more than that of the scientific calculators we wielded as GCE O-Level
students, less than a decade later. And
it was, of course, a tiny fraction of that packed into the domestic lap-top
device on which I type this, or the pocket gizmo on which you may well be
reading it.
So far - so
familiar. Such technological advancement
over half a century may seem impressive - but already, not as surprising as it
once might. None of the school children
I encounter daily at work can have any real concept of a world in which their
every task isn’t electronically assisted, or most of their social interactions aren’t
digitally networked. And the graph of
exponential change accelerates ever more acutely.
For an admittedly arms-length, late adopter - like myself, each new attempt to up-skill
myself often involves investing considerable mental effort to learn something
that, it turns out, the cool kids all regard as last year’s news [2.].
Even in my mid fifties, I can’t help wondering at what point I’ll just
have to sink back in exhausted bafflement - finally resigned to letting it all
pass me by, as the robotic Care Assistant patiently spoons lukewarm soup into
my mouth.
Well, I’m not quite
there yet. Indeed, if anything, my
current attitude is one of slightly more enthusiastic embrace of the new toys,
and not least, of the ways they might aid and abet my creative practice. I’ve talked a lot in recent months about my
urge to incorporate different or new media within my overall ambit, and (more
relevantly here) - a desire to acknowledge some sense of Process, and the
inescapable influence of The Digital Realm (note the portentous capitals)
within my own work. I’ve often mentioned
(probably to the point of tedium) viewing Tate Modern's impressive ‘Painting After Technology’ display - not
least because it was one my most influential gallery experiences of recent years. It is possibly no accident that many of the
artists on display there were of a similar vintage to myself [3.].
Anyway, in an
attempt to embrace somewhat more of, what some in educational circles term a
‘Growth Mindset’, I have started to compile a scratch wish-list of technological
devices or methods with which I have yet to interact meaningfully [4.].
Baffling though that may be to many who regard them as old news,
Smartphones and Tablet devices are high on that list. I’ve carried a Smartphone for a couple of
years now, but without really unlocking its potential much beyond texting,
emailing and taking the occasional shaky photo.
My experience of iPads, (other electronic tea trays are available –
obviously), was even more limited before I made these images. Somewhere in my mind, I’d created a false division
between those gizmos you pilot with a keyboard/mouse combo, and those with
greasy screens that you rub with your fingers.
Anyway, it’s
clear the novelty of mobile (soon to be wearable or surgically implanted)
technology isn’t wearing off anytime soon, and, more to the point, that many
folk have already been using them, in numerous creative ways, for a long
time. Thus, as our students clicked away
with a variety of cameras, (and, comfortingly, - also drew in sketchbooks), I
braved the ignominy of being “one of those twonks who wave iPads
around”. I deliberately set about collecting photos that could then be
manipulated in a fairly immediate manner, on the same device.
The results are
probably pretty trite and, whilst resolutely urban, don’t particularly relate
to much else in my current work. In some
respects, they’re little more than those never-ending, neon scribbles we all
made back when the possibility of making any kind of image on a computer screen
first suggested itself. I did enjoy
making them though - not least for their rapid immediacy, and the potential for
a kind of photographic/digital sketchbook, to which they point. I relish the idea of combining a photographic
moment with a more organic intervention, made at the speed of thought and
gesture of a swiped finger. I was also
pleased to discover that the cut-down version of Photoshop I used, (something I
believe the young people are calling an ‘App’
– imagine!), offered just enough of it’s big brother’s potential – particularly in the interaction between layers, layer modes and filter effects.
Strangely, I can
even imagine that working like this might even encourage me to draw more than I
have done of late, and for images to evolve with more spontaneity than has sometimes
been the case. The other point worth
making is that, as with all digital ways of working, the scope for versioning
and variations on a theme is pretty limitless; and that’s something that’s been
clearly preoccupying me all year.
Will I be doing
more of this kind of thing in the near future?
Like a lot of stuff recently, these images merely scratch the surface of
something novel (to me), but they do seem to suggest considerable
possibilities. The trick, as ever, will
be to work out how to integrate that into my wider practice. Or, for now, it might just imply loads more fun
playing around with something new.
[1.]: This is probably over-romanticised
fantasy. I never saw the fabled Machine
Room. In passing, I did however visit my
Dad’s workplace on a couple of occasions when he was summoned to open the
branch for the Police - because the alarm had gone off after hours. It turned out to be simply a new alarm system
bedding in, but how was a schoolboy even allowed to accompany adults into the
scene of a possible bank robbery? I can only conclude it
really was a different world, (never mind being locked in the car outside a pub
with a packet of crisps!)
[2.]: That glib reference, is in itself, quite
illuminating. The large comprehensive
secondary school I attended in the 1970s possessed only one or two primitive,
student-accessible computers that I’m aware of.
Only the elite Mathematics and Physics students inducted into the
lunchtime Computer Club used them. Those
of us with aspirations to attend Art College, or go on to study English or
Humanities at University would chuckle at their briefcases and mystifying punch
cards. The ‘Cool Kids’ - they definitely
weren’t. (To be honest – neither was I
really, but I did feel like I was destined to breathe the same air as them).
[3.]: I’ve queried before, whether younger folk
might themselves regard all this self-reflexive focus, on the novel
characteristics of technologies they just take for granted, as slightly quaint.
[4.]: Loth
though I am to credit Donald Rumsfeld with anything good, I do find his oft-derided
concept of ‘Known Unknowns’ surprisingly useful. In fact, the most superficial research reveals that, perhaps not surprisingly, he didn't originate the idea at all.
