'The Garage'

During the winter holidays, a good friend from home needed help clearing out her home garage. This garage was a place where a group of us would hang out regularly in high school, from the ages of 15-18. We hadn't been in there for almost three years and after revisiting saw everything had was way it was left, but with natural world taking over what had been abandoned by man. The huge sense of nostalgia and with the current state of it, we decided it would be a fun idea to photograph what was left and make a zine for the people who visited the garage to have. 

As such, we took some film photographs to capture the aged feel of the garage as well aspects of our adolescence. The garage was a complete DIY space. If someone did a painting we chucked it in wherever, the seating was stuff we found left at skips and consisted of some old sofas, a car seat and a wheelchair. As there was no power, we lit the place with battery powered fairy lights, candles and lanterns. We were young and this was our space. 3 years later, vines grew along the entire walls, cobwebs had made their way over everything and dried dead leaves covered the floor. 

When taking the photographs I wanted to capture sort of dirty vibrancy of the place, as well as the chaos of teenage culture. The end compositions sought to be simple yet rustic in this way. The use of film was to ensure the nostalgic feel was translated visually. 

The simplicity in their compositions worked really well when using colour and form to distort the layout, giving the zine its identity. Small features and possibility initially brushed over colours are accentuated to make the end images more interesting, aiding the viewing to look beyond an initial mess. 

The end zine has not been produced yet, as more photos want to be gathered. During winter it was hard to get great lighting, so it was decided that I would go back in summer to take more images, and then we will clear it out. With a side project like this, there is little time pressure which is both a good and bad thing. The concept and visual literacy for the publication is set, but bulking it out would be better for its purpose, before we get rid of it forever. There is even talking of us re-decorating the space, which may be nice to add a photo of at the end, connoting the beginning of a new chapter. This has now become a project that will be completed by the end of summer.