Guy Batey

untitled, from the Melancholy of Objects series. 2008-2009. dimensions not specified.


untitled, from the Melancholy of Objects series. 2008-2009. dimensions not specified.


untitled, from the Melancholy of Objects series. 2008-2009. dimensions not specified.


Piano, from the Melancholy of Objects series. 2008-2009. dimensions not specified.


I chose to blog about Guy Batey becuase of how he creates portraits of found objects in the land/cityscape. The composition of the photographs are very inspiring to me, since much of my work revolves around the found object, that being a bike jump/ramp, trail markers, and other scars and manipulations in the land. I have felt that many of my photographs seem to do that, centralized the object and let the landscape fall into the periphery, to create a balance within the frame and a very centralized aesthetic.

I also like the sculptural and architectural space that is apparent in the work. These seem to be documents of abandonment, but also in a sense found sculptures. They're photographed in a centralized theme that puts the focus straight on the center object and creates spatial tensions within him images. The found nature and unaltered (from the photographers point of view) object creates a visual poetry of our space and remnants of human behavior.


Quotes:

"This is the world of the found object, and Guy's Flickr set begins with things----often trivial, humble objects--- and the way we apprehend them. This set of pictures of objects is more a phenomenological approach to things, than one that works within art history---eg., the object as an arsenal in the surrealist avant garde expressing the return of the repressed. The uncanny is present but it avoids collapsing things into fetishism or the return of the repressed desire as understood by psychoanalysis.

These found objects are humble, common objects that have been accidentally found and not deliberately planted."


The Melancholy of Objects is a series of portraits of
objects I've found in Southwark, south-east London. This
is my neighbourhood. I've lived here for years and walk
these streets almost every day. The streets are full of the
stuff of life - discarded, lost and forgotten. Some of the
objects talk to me. These photographs are my reply.

-Guy Batey

Website
Interview
No gallery representation