BLOG 2018

FINE ART PHOTOGRAPHY

03/07/2018
Combining a Ford Mustang with a sculpture that mimics the iconic running horse as the cars logo was always going to be a tricky one in terms of location, in January I covered some photos of Dave Stower's classic 914 Porsche at the Medway campus where Kent University are based, the setting was perfect and also a good link as Deborah was covering her degree just over the road at Chatham Maritime. "Odyssey" is quite compact in size so I wanted to show it in the foreground as much as possible, the lighting was important on the culture and also on the car, three lights were used, the small Profoto A1 for the horse and the Profoto B1 and B2 either side of the Ford Mustang, a mixture of apertures gave depth to the image and at F4 brought more prominence to Odyssey.

Deborah Abbott was born in 1968 in Sheffield and initially trained as a nurse, before receiving a first class BA Hons ‘Creative Arts for Theatre and Film’ from The University for the Creative Arts. She is currently studying MA Fine Art at the University of Kent.

Abbott works with a wide variety of materials and media, ranging from metal, ceramics to sound and light. Her current practice is born out of a personal struggle with disability, specifically brain injury and the attempt to explore a translation of the experience of pain, trauma and dysfunction within the internal (microscopic neurones in the head) into an expanded, externalised form of matter, image and duration. Her work aims to challenge societal misconceptions of disability and to take the viewer to a place where they can develop empathy with, and even embody, the physical struggles of others.