iAMquinn is a photographic project that is going to explore the issues and anxieties that 17 year old transgender and non-binary teenager Quinn Rowbottom faces on a day to day basis. As a young transgender, non-binary person, Quinn has a lot of issues surrounding her in everyday situations and this project is going to visually explore some of those issues. iAMquinn has two purposes; firstly to open up the world of non-binary to those who misunderstand or who aren’t aware of the non-binary community, and to inform them about what it really means to be non-binary. And secondly, iAMquinn was created to help myself grieve for my brother in a positive way, buy creating these images and to help myself and Quinn create a new bond. Moreover, I want the family and friends of those in a similar situation to Quinn, to be able to look at these images and understand that it’s okay to feel sad or angry about the situation, but that eventually it gets easier to move on and deal with the change.
Many young people are experiencing an identity crisis, with the pressure to keep up with current trends growing stronger than ever, they often lose themselves along the way. Growing up in a household with a millennial, I have witnessed first-hand the effect our technology filled world has on a young mind and as a result British millennials have the second worst mental health well-being in the world.
Moreover, I want to explore the effect this world has on millennials and their gender identity. 1 in 120 people in the UK identify as gender non-binary (over 224,000 people). These people are not protected by the law and often feel marginalised by the media, the government and by society itself. This project is also a way for myself to understand what Quinn goes through seemingly on her own, as she is my sibling. For the past year my family has been struggling to understand the term non-binary and what it means for Quinn, the news came as a shock to us and we were uneducated as to what the term actually meant. I want this project to be able to open up communication between the non-binary community and those who misunderstand them.
Production Methods
The body of work will consist of around 10-12 images that all represent a fear, worry or issue that Quinn faces on a daily basis. I want an audience to look at the images and be able to relate to it in some way, however they decide to interpret each image. More issues that I want to explore with iAMquinn include: her name change, the way she dresses, the acceptance (or lack of) from her family and friends and the change in mine and Quinn’s relationship as siblings. Quinn will be the main model in the images throughout the project, but the images may include others such as myself or family members.I also want to push away from just issues, and explore the happier side of Quinn’s life. I want to photograph where she feels most content (although I would still like to stick with the running theme of Quinn’s eyes avoiding the camera). This is because iAMquinn has been created to educate people about non-binary, and I do not want to create the idea that being non-binary is one big negative experience. I need to show people that yes, it is difficult for Quinn, myself and our family, but the outcome of this process is that Quinn gets to be who she wants to be, and she’s lucky enough that her family is still here to support her. My hopes for this project is to develop it so that those who are non-binary and are too scared to come out publicly, can look at Quinn’s journey and see that there are struggles, but at the end you can openly be yourself. The final images will be printed at A1 or A2, I am yet to make this decision as it depends on how many images I would like to include in my final project (due to cost and space). In my final show I would like to present them hung from the ceiling set out so that a viewer will have to walk through them and travel on the journey through the images with Quinn. I also want the first image to be a portrait of Quinn that the audience will view and then walk behind, this will symbolise them going behind the face of the project (Quinn) and going into her mind to understand the fears and issues. The project will be a collaboration between myself and Quinn to produce images that symbolise her fears/ issues and anxieties.
Research Requirements
For this project I am going to be researching into the kinds of situations non-binary or transgender people face day to day, whether this is stereotyping, ignorance or people just misunderstanding them. I will conduct this research using both questionnaires and secondary research online on websites such as ‘Beyond the Binary’ and looking at the ever growing collection of online articles about non-binary. I am also going to do some research with Quinn, to find out more about the positive side of her non-binary and the stereotypes she wishes to break with iAMquinn. I am also going to be researching into narrative photographers such as Kirsty Mitchell and her series Wonderland, which she created after the death of her mother. Mitchell used her photography as a way to cope and grieve with the loss of her mother, by creating images that each had their own individual fairy tale story. iAMquinn has acted as a form of phototherapy for myself and for Quinn, so I will also be researching into Jo Spence, who used photography to document her fight with cancer and to also break the taboo of breast cancer for women. I believe that iAMquinn is somewhere in the middle of Mitchell and Spence, between fantasy and reality, documentary and make-believe.
Audience
This project would be presented in a gallery set out, so that a viewer/audience will have to walk through the images as though they were walking on a journey with Quinn. However for the end of year show I only have about 8ft of wall/space, so the images will have to be quite close together, yet I would like to print at A1 so that the audience can see all the detail in the images but they can also see the thought process that goes into each image. I would like my initial audience to be younger people who are part of the millennial generation, who can relate to the images even if it’s in their own context. I would also like iAMquinn to reach people who are in a similar situation to not just Quinn, but myself also. I would like the images to help them to try and understand their loved one’s situation, but to also show them that it is okay to be sad or angry about the situation, but there is light at the end of the tunnel.
paigerowbottom 