Before I start explaining this project I would have noted that the dictionary definition of home is:
“The place where one lives permanently, especially as a member of a family or household.”
For this final brief I had so many ideas in my head, because to me the word ‘Home’ can mean so many things, in its simplest form home is where you feel comfortable and at peace, but to others it can be simply be where you are living at the moment in time. Coming to Uni technically has changed my home, but i don’t feel this way. My original idea involved a pig heart and taking the idea of ‘home is where the heart is’ and playing on this pun, but there was a moment that changed my mind. I was walking home one day and i saw in the window of a flat giant white letters that spelled out the word ‘Home’ and this then inspired my idea, since to that student who put that up, that room was there home, but to me my flat was not home, so I knew I wanted to show more in this project.
All my life I have lived in the country, I was raised in the country, spent all my school life living in solitude, excluding some horses and alpaca, but for most this would be annoying since there would be no entertainment, but for me this was way more than fine, I loved it, living the middle of absolute nowhere. The peace and tranquillity of the country side is so exhilarating and at the same time so quite, living there is such a different experience to living in the city. So my ideas for this project were totally overwhelming, I had to narrow my mind, i knew Lincoln didn’t feel like my ‘home’ but i knew that when I was walking through a park that it felt so much more like a homely environment then any bed or games consol could.
Still thinking about this concept I travelled home, not knowing what would take my eye, if anything, but it was at this point I started thinking about photographers who had much experience in scenery and shooting wildlife, luckily the two photographers i found were very helpful in showing me not only the absolute beauty of the country side, but also the lasting effects of the photographs themselves.
Adem Berton
Bill Atkinson
After viewing all these different images of multiple countryside’s I knew that i had to take a walk around Evedon (my village) and photograph what truly inspired me about my place of childhood. Since I think that a lot of our memories that are linked with home stem from our memories, which personally is very easily triggered by the smell of a newly blossomed flower or the sound of the wind rushing through the leaves of a tree.
I took roughly 30 images, I was thinking of myself of a professional when I took these, I merely wanted to gain an understanding of my ability and also the scope I was trying to capture in these images, luckily I was so surprised that my nature photography had proven successful. But this project was about the idea of ‘home’ so I then made the choice to pick the photos that mean the most to me as an individual and hope that when you read this you understand my decision
Final Images
This close up of a bug was me experimenting with many different styles of shots, this extreme close up is a reminder of the wildlife that i grew up around, it is just one element that makes the ‘home’ experience for me.
This picture reminds me of the walk to school i had to take, its anouther part of my life and of my ‘home’ experience. I love how the water fits so perfectly still in the middle of the green.
This is my house, which i think does needed to be added just to give some context to these images, an average shot, but it still holds a special place in my memories.
This picture is very dilibrate, since i have never been in this church, and have always shyed away from it, therefore when i took this picture i sheilded myself using nature, which i think made for a very good image, showing the green nature against the old church yard.
Gates and feilds; the wheat the feilds produce, this is all just so homely to me and this is why i had to include it, i knew i wanted just a few crops in sight, just to have that nice foucs around them, making them the subject of the image.
Finally we have the autumn leaf, floating on the water in blissful silence, to me I really do imagine this leaf being more than just any old leaf, it is symbolic of my home, it’s so calm and it changes through the seasons, but it will always be there in some form, like now, i am away from home but when i return there will still be leaves and there will still be my family, and on a more morbid note, when they do pass i will still think of Evedon as home, it holds grand memories and feelings that i cannot feel anywhere else.
Home is about what we as a person define as our place, that place where we are at our calmest, we are able to put our guards down and embrace our environment and surrounding. I love how everyone can view one topic slightly different, I just see it as being very green indeed.