User:Paula Winkler/Paula's Project Proposal II

Working title: procrastination - clouds from my desk

What do you want to make?

I am currently working on a systematic collection of photographs I make of clouds, outside my studio window in Berlin and Rotterdam. The working title is procrastination - clouds from my desk (or A Cloud Journal). The images show nothing more than different variations of sky with clouds at different times of the day. They are dominated by their reduced but intense color palette that includes different kinds of blue, orange/red and grey. I keep the pictures in portrait format to create a greater sense of depths and a wider range of color gradients -especially the evening sky comprises more nuances. While in some photographs you can recognize a sky with clouds, in others you are moving towards a sense of abstraction. Some images include a swarm of birds or a far away trace of a plane. None of the images show buildings or a skyline that would place them in a distinct urban environment, it feels as if they could have been taken anywhere. Each image is at the same time unique and universal. I'm aiming at a substantial amount of images, let's say 365 - one of each day of the year, to evoke a feeling of endlessness and repetition. Even though I work with composition and colors in each individual image carefully, they will unfold their impact within their quantity. I'm not quite sure yet what kind of dramaturgy I'm aiming at. I will have to find out if I prefer a certain time of the day with its specific brightness and colors or if I want a narrative that carries the spectator through different times of the day. The appropriate form of display will have to be determined when the collection is big enough to do an extensive edit. I can image presenting the images in a self-published photobook (maybe with an accompanying lightbox or print on the wall) but it could also turn out the best way to present the work would be as prints on the wall, forming an abstract image from far and breaking into individual images coming closer.

Why do you want to make it?

My goal is to evoke a contemplative state of mind that unfolds between looking at the images and the direction of thought I'm giving the spectator by referring to the concept of procrastination in the title of the work. I take my own experience with procrastination as a starting point for this work knowing that everyone can relate in some way or the other. I record the images that I see everyday when I sit at my desk trying to come up with something meaningful, with a wandering mind. I use the images and offer them to others, inviting them let their mind drift away.

Looking at clouds has a deeply contemplative if not spiritual effect on me. Especially sitting at my desk it instantly evokes thoughts about time, scale, disintegration, transformation, significance, deficiency and the absolute inability to even slightly grasp our existence. It also makes me think about photography and the intense wish to stop time to be able to look at this specific arrangement of vanishing colors and textures for as long as I wish to do so. It creates a melancholic but perfectly satisfied state of mind in which I feel deeply connected to the world.

I find looking at images of clouds almost as fulfilling, they have the power to take me on an internal journey.

Time table & How do you plan to make it

I am photographing new images almost every day and I immediately print them out as sketches to build up a collection that I can quickly look at. I make notes of the date and time each image has been recorded.

On Mondays I will sit down and go through all images recorded during the week. I will then make a selection of images that I will send away to get them printed nicely on different types of paper. I will make sure that I include different atmospheres and I will also try black and white prints.

Relation to former practice

I have a project based practice. For each work I determine a tight framework in which I operate in a serial way. For my former work worldpeace the framework for example was: 1. Find images of ecstatic beauty queens online 2. Zoom in on their faces 3. Eliminate traces of beauty contests such as jewellery. The current framework is 1. Take images of clouds from my desk

Relation to larger context

Ed Rusha - 26 Gasoline Stations

Joel Meyerowitz - New Color Photography

Hiroshi Sugimoto

Photography and the Narrative

Limits of Representation