My photographs inhabit a world where memory and fiction coexist. To serve as a reminder that there is no single great narrative. We all see things differently, indeed as individuals we even see things differently from moment to moment. What a pointless idea then to try and capture any particular one.
My aim is to create work which plays games with the desire to be presented with a truth, a true image – my photographs deny our preconceptions of what should be or has been.
PINHOLE CAMERAS
When I make images (1.5m x 0.5m) with a pinhole camera I expose directly onto the paper in the simplest possible way. No manipulation or fancy lenses. Very little control. The photograph arrives as a gift, revealing the unexpected and presenting me with a view I didn’t know existed. I began with a desire to make self portraits – without me in them – by recording the marks of where I had been in my home. I made my furniture into pinhole cameras.
Scale, and the way it is affected by the shaping and positioning of the camera is a major factor in the work; banisters become cathedral columns, the corridor in my house – a motorway.
Eventually I escaped the house, and myself, by inventing light-weight fabric cameras. I was curious to see what effect it would have on my practice to be so constrained by the cumbersome nature of the camera and the restriction of one photo per outing.
I discovered an empty quiet, with space where anything might have happened or be about to happen. Add to this the pinhole camera’s ability to make a photograph which has every part in focus – no matter how close or far – and it makes you feel as if you could reach out and touch it.
VIDEOS
My pinhole work is essentially performative. The showing and telling of the doing can even become the work itself. I am making video sketches which have become pieces of work in their own right and can sometimes accompany the phtotographs.
TEXT
I work with text which is inspired by the work and belongs somehow in parallel to the images, though not as yet on the gallery wall. I have an artists’ book published by the Winchester Gallery – ‘Burnt On’ – which relates to my work in India.
Resume
Anna Cady Born: Walton on Thames, UK
Education 1998-2000
MA Goldsmiths 1998 BA Visual Art 1st Winchester 1973 BA textiles Farnham
Solo Shows
2006 New Greenham Arts, Newbury
2005 The Winchester Gallery
2005 Valley School, Bangalore
2005 Debenhams window as part of the Hat Fair, Winchester
2004 fotonet-south billboards in Winchester
Group Shows
2004 Poole Photography festival
2004 -02 ‘Bad Quality’ a Southern Arts touring exhibition
2002 Aspex, Portsmouth ‘Homemade’
Residencies
2006 St George’s Special School
2004-5 India: Valley School Bangalore
2006 -2002 Residencies with Creative Partnerships
Awards
2004 Arts Council Funding for India trip, technician and exhibition
2004 fotonet-south bursary
2002 Arts Council Funding – Creative writing
2000 New Forest Arts, New Milton, 3rd prize Fuji sponsored award
Publications
2005 ’Burnt On’ – artist’s book
Performance
2005 Debenhams window as part of the Hat Fair, Winchester
Teaching 2000-1998
Brockwood Park School 2001- 1991
Open College of the Arts – Tutor and assessor
Additional information
1973-94 - Worked as weaver/textile designer/teacher/consultant
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