MFA Blogs

Introductions

Football have always been my favourite hobby and had a huge influence on my life. My earliest memory is the 2010 world cup. I recall always seeing football stars on commercials on a daily bases as a kid in China and I believe so around the world. This shows how influential this very sport can be. I really got into the sport because of family and friends. My family had always been football fanatics, my grandfather and father would always stay up till dawn to watch the games. When I attended school briefly in Beijing in 2012, my friends were always on the field during break time, kicking around so I fell in love with the game as-well. For me 90mins is filled with excitement. You never know if you team is gonna when or loose, especially when your team makes a comeback in the final moment of the game, it gets my heart pumping. Not only I fell in love with the game, it also changed me as a person. I use to be quite introverted, both mentally and physically unfit. Thorough football I was able to over come these aspect in life. Therefore I wanted to dedicate this project to football, for all its done for me and for others like me.

Still Life

pitch side

Didier Drogba

Didier Drogba: How Ivory Coast striker helped to halt civil war in his home nation - Olivier Guiberteau, BBC

"Auckland Indoor Football Group"

After taking some time off playing football, I found myself playing among a new group of football fans. A friend of mine took me to play with him with this group who calls themselves the "Auckland indoor football group" and since then I could not control myself to miss one single game. To me the 3 hours every Saturday I spend on the pitch is a mental escape or mediation. It's where I can go to clear my mind, not having to think about anything, just enjoying the game. What makes me fall in love with this group is not only the game, but the people. Chatting to the people there, have allowed me to really unpack their unique characteristics. This made me decide this year's project I will focus on this group of people.

Irving Penn

Still Life & Vouge

"Stadium, GAME ON"

people & community - what it means

Wide Angel - Portraiture and People An interview with Edith Amituanai

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"Super Stars"

Studio Portraiture

Deana Lawson’s Kingdom of Restored Glory By Zadie Smith, April 30, 2018

"Speed, Power, Composure!"

Sound Track

"Wrestlers Love America" - Collier Schorr, Interview with Art 21

Serbians

My experience joining and playing in a Serbian indoor group

Race You There - TZE MING MOK

"Bleeding Socks"

Still Life

Social roles of sport organisations: developments, contexts and challenges - Maikel Waardenburg

Super Stars pt 2

Reflection of photographs on the commercial side

2021 Mid-Year Installation

Mid Year Assessment

Self-portrait

Still life

September Seminar Reflection

-The September seminar ended with a lot of holes to be filled. First point I want to summarize is the oral presentation. I feel like there are still a few points that need to be looked into deeper. In the feedback, it suggested I should look deeper into the artist and the way they think.

-“The audience had questions about the role of the individual and collective groupings in forming community identity. It may be productive to think further about the overarching concepts emerging from your work, and how they are present to different degrees in different individual works but don’t have to illustrate the concept.”

-Second, I want to reflect on the body of work I presented for the critique. Honestly it has been really hard for me during the past month or so. I chose to present the still life series because I thought it was the best way to work with the lockdown circumstances. Photographing the still life series is not what I intended to do, I felt like when it was presented, it was still quite underdeveloped. Going forward, I think it is definitely something to work with.

A few questions were brought up during the crit. Few of the key questions include the choice of object, identity and how it represents football. I think a good way to answer those questions is by having more images, maybe in that way it will help the audience to have a better understanding of the concept of identity.