This exercise was far more difficult and time consuming than it first appears.
I made six sets of images, and then made a decision on the final three.
Set 01 – Banks
The austerity years have taken their toll on the poorer members of our society coupled with the fact Banks have made it very difficult for poorer families to get credit. Food banks are now becoming a necessary part of life, not only for the unemployed, but for low income families were both parents are working in poorly paid jobs which mean they cannot manage to pay rent and feed themselves without help from these voluntary organisations.
Set 02 – Tan Fantastic Twins
These images work very well together both the colour and angle of the subject work very well. I feel the only issue with them is the eyes, they make me wonder who is the wisest of these two creatures.
The way Trump behaves on Twitter, I think I have an answer but that’s for the viewer to decide.
Set 03 – Tea and Coffee
I wanted these images of these patriotic mugs to get the audience thinking about globalisation and the effect it has on creativity. Same mug different continent. The backgrounds on these images imply the nature of our two nations the US bright and positive whilst the UK was dark and stoic.
Set 04 – Cola Wars
These images work on to illustrate Junkstaposition very well, the first being to start the discussion “which do you prefer”? The issue is as a visual device it has been done to death and there is nothing to offer the viewer that they haven’t seen before. The stark differences in branding become very noticeable when you study the packaging. The colours, typeface and shape of bottles ensure that they both dominate the supermarket shelves across the world..
Image 05 – Fur
These images on one level show the difference in the markings on these beautiful animals. It also asks the viewer what the relationship between these animals is, the reply is rather chilling, Predator and Prey.
Image 06 – Beach
This was the first pair of images I worked on. The horrific photograph which chills me to the bone is that of the Syrian refugee child Alan Kirdi who drowned whilst trying to reach Greece with his parents. The anger and frustration that this image makes me feel is quite extraordinary.
I searched for two days to find a complementary image, but I found some images they could not compete with the stark reality of the first one. I think this may be the one that got away, but I will still keep looking.
This is a great exercise to get you thinking about what you need to show the viewer rather than putting your own construct on the images which is very difficult not to do.
The strongest sets that I put forward are
Set 01 – Banks
Set 02 – Tanfanstic Twins
Set 05 – Fur
The Graphics Guy 