The goal of this project is to visually explore socio-economically disadvantaged communities through the creation of photographically based personal narrations. Such stories may help in countering the public perception of these communities as homogeneous groups of ‘victims’.
Our community-driven, photographic production and distribution cycle operates in the hybrid space of the virtual and material world, of culture and politics. The project aims to develop a participatory, ethnography-driven approach in which personal stories within a socio-economically disadvantaged community are produced with the help of digital images.
Next to that, it wants to investigate the impact of bouncing the digital images back to the community in a materialized form that can be further intervened upon. And finally it wants to explore the potential of an online platform to reach people within and outside the community, inform their perceptions of the community and generate social interactions.
Van der Stock investigates how this collaborative approach can be developed as an artistic practice. The project wants to close the circle between digital and analogue images through a material track (by printing the images) and a virtual track (by publishing them on Facebook). The research will focus on the transgender community in India.
(c) Liza Van der Stock