Since September, I have been been working on a series of work which I titled 'folklore', this project explores the old English cottage way of living through a cottage core aesthetic style of imagery, this highlighting the traditional lifestyle, skills and livelihood as well as reflecting on the way of keeping focused and productive during the COVID 19 lockdowns.
By producing a zine to display my body of work, I have been looking towards creating photographic pieces which bring to life different hand crafted skills such as baking, knitting, sewing, landscape that overlook the English countryside and self portraiture that defines the cottage core fashion aesthetic that I have been reflecting on throughout this entire project. the images have been naturally lit to keep with the old traditional way of living, linking throughout the entirety of the project. I have got in contact with small businesses and writers to involve some of their own work into this zine, creating a sense of a community throughout this project, also looking at the way a community of people in the traditional English cottage style live.
The title 'Folklore' describes the way of living in this English cottage way, and old traditional style that had been experienced by previous generations. By living with these out of date skills, cultures and beliefs myself, I was able to fully engage myself into this project, basing the entirety of this feeling of isolation due to the pandemic into my own way of working, producing imagery and living in my day to day life.
This project has evolved more than any other project that I have worked on previously, the world we are currently living in shifted the way I saw my usual daily life, not just for me but for the entire world. My experience, living 100 miles away from my family, being isolated and alone with little activity and direct social contact, I had to change the way I lived, distracting myself with hand crafted traditional skills to block out the noice of the world outside, keeping me focused. this project started with simple portrait shots where I tried to capture the cottage core aesthetic, this evolved into something much bigger with a deeper relevance to the world we are currently living in, it has become a diary of my way of coping during a global pandemic, a self help guide to my mental health due to being isolated from everyone I know, a portal into a world of nature and beauty; a distraction from reality.
cover design for Folklore zine