Eleventh International Conference on The Image

Abstract

“Point, rise, balance, hold. Knowing where you wish to go—Spring out from this mould.” This Haiku was inspired by an English Language student’s encounter with a photograph of sparkly ballerina shoes. The wearer is absent from the image, fueling the student’s intrigue into who they might be. The image provokes the possibilities of a fictional identity, leading the student to create an imagined persona, developing skills in creative thinking, and challenging the traditional notions of a prescribed identity. The photograph is from my project titled “Shoe and Tell” that photographs the shoes individuals are wearing, and documents experiences of identity at key life stages, from teenagers to graduating students. The taking of the image enables the wearer to perform their identity, and in contrast, the image becomes a provocation for my students to encounter, experience and interpret meaning through visual forms. This paper presents the research project and the role of images as mediums through which identity is communicated, and also experienced by university students as viewers and re-interpreters. The images are dialogic as they enable individuals to narrate their experiences of self, and within an interdisciplinary educational context they become blank canvases for students to re-imagine relationships between identity, style and social context. Identity is not static, and the image enables the experience and interpretation of its fluidity for the photographed, and for the viewer. Within this research the image becomes central to the experience of self and in response initiates a creative approach to interpreting identity.