So I have gotten a bit behind with this project, even though I know I have done some fabulous and in-depth research and a lot of it. However while I have been away in the last couple of days, my mum was rushed to hospital, in Mexico, as she was in immense pain, and they discovered a huge amount of fluid in her abdomen, and two tumours, 8cm in size, and one on each ovary. Since then, obviously the focus has been on her, sorting out the travel insurance, and working out how to get her home for the urgent surgery she needs.
However I am using this post to try and show the direction I am thinking of heading in by reflecting on my research.
I tried to reach out to different people, some who talk about trauma on youtube and social media, and public speakers on the topic, but of yet I have had no response. Therefore even though I think it would be great to make this project participatory, at this time this is not possible. Therefore I want to make it more autoethnographical, but still be informed by research and others experiences. Therefore I had to look at my own trauma and PTSD and try to work out what do I want to express. Which experiences do I want to bring to light? I decided to use my experience of domestic abuse, even though I have other experiences which contribute to my PTSD. Because I then can continue the use of the ideas of my minor project, and there is more there I want to continue, and I believe this could be a great continuation of the work. And with me most of my PTSD come from that experience, because even though I experience rape, in a stand alone experience, that was still a huge part of my experience of domestic abuse. There is the most material to work with by focusing in on my domestic abuse experience.
Interaction has been hugely on my mind when considering this project, I think it is important for the viewer to be able to simulate how confusing and difficult it is to process, plus the emotional, triggering response as well. I have some more research on this which I will process soon once I have some more time, and have calmed down from the current situation. But I am thinking of a book, and how you see the repetitive nature, and triggers. But also the idea of explore the memories, so some pages can be a pop up book. Or some pages could fold out, when there are holes in the memories, I could literally cut holes out of the pages and you can see through to the next. I could use different papers to overlay on top of the images to make them hazy, or the feeling they are just out of reach. Add sliders onto the pages so you can reveal different parts of the images. But due to fact that the exhibition this year will be online, I want to see if I can reproduce this digitally, as where you click on different parts of the images and that reveals something new, or it zooms in, or makes things clearer. I know I can achieve this with using invisible links on a powerpoint document and then making that an interactive pdf. However I need to see if I can make this an online version, so it can be placed on a website for a digital exhibition. I know some basic coding, but not enough at this moment to make this work. But something to explore and see if I can learn the skills to achieve this on a very short time frame. However, side note, even before what has happened with my mum, I have had extenuating circumstances approved, therefore my deadline is now 9th June.
I have started to explore what the imagery may look like, however I think this will be something I work heavily on in the 10 days I am self isolating after I return to the UK hopefully on Tuesday morning, if my covid test when I am in the US is negative.
In previous posts I have started to explore methodologies and styles, however I think it is down now to experimentation. Drawing and painting things, scanning and photographing then cutting them up to create images reprehensive of traumatic memories and how that influences PTSD. I am still looking at printmaking, because of the repetitive nature of flashbulb memories and triggers, I really think this methodology would work, and by using multiple plates and mixing them up I can create combinations which show to confusing and overwhelming nature of PTSD.