Education

Master Student / Meisterschülerin of Prof. Joachim Brohm, Academy of Fine Arts Leipzig / HGB Leipzig, 2015 - 2018

 

MA (Distinction) Documentary Photography, London College of Communication, University of the Arts London, 2012

 

BA (Hons) European Studies, University of Limerick, 1993 - 1997

 

For an up to date CV including exhibitions, please visit the artist's website

At the core of my artistic practice is the question of place and what it makes of us, and how photography, charged with political motivations and ideologies, can be used to construct a sense of place. This is where my interest in producing images begins, and reflects a formative period before my artistic career when I studied politics and history. Working between a conceptual and documentary approach to image making, I explore notions of space, place and belonging in urban spaces, corporate developments and border territories, and the sociopolitical forces that shape them. Grounded by research, I interpret these familiar landscapes of everywhere and nowhere and objects found within, in a new view over time, exposing their surfaces and materials and the output of the individual labourer. What arises in the process, through photographic and text based series, sequencing, cutting and repetition is a new experience of the remoteness of the real.

 

Text provided by the artist

Public space occupies an important ideological position in democratic societies. Creeping privatisation has made the use of such space, that in theory is open and free to all, increasingly conditional. “We cannot fight against our bread” is an exploration and questioning of urban and rural spaces that were once public lands, and invites contemplation of the mechanisms of control and power that determine these landscapes. The installation brings together four works: a single channel projection of 26 images (all taken with permission) of privately owned public squares located in the centre of London; 13 stainless steel plates engraved with the aspirational slogans of their global corporate owners, and a single framed image of machine cut stones destined for a new urban development. Líne, a polyptych composed of 36 framed inkjet prints, is a remapping of the boundary of the farm in Ireland, where I grew up.

 

Text provided by the artist

Artist website: www.bernadettekeating.com