James Goodchild

MFA Photography

Mamiaith

An inquiry into why I make photographs led me to look into my own heritage, background, and most importantly language.  Mamiaith (Welsh for mother-tongue) is a series of 145 images taken in Wales, my birthplace, which once displayed presents its own code or language a language of imagery rather than words.  Initially hard to decipher it is only when the viewer draws closer to the images that they reveal themselves.  Like black ink for a poet the silver crystals reaction to light presents my voice, my language.

To make a photograph I need to stop looking to invoke myself in that time and space to connect to a feeling, and when this happens it means I have made that connection.   Silence and whispers are far more ardent than noise and shouting, and it’s this intensity which I am trying to create through my images portraying photographs of ornamental rather than persuasive speech, creating an object that can be cherished and showing a moment that initially might not seem to have any importance but ultimately does.  

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