PHOTOGRAPHY
Excerpts from Master Photography theses
with
Anniina Koivu
AUTHOR: Sara Bastai
TITLE: How to build a collective memory in the digital realm?
SUBTITLE: Depicting humankind through methods of
preservation
It seems, sometimes, like today’s main focus of interest lies in how future
societies will perceive us. The traces we might leave behind can significantly
impact the history and interpretation of our current present. Can we rely on
digital preservation? What should we document for the future? How can we
represent and preserve society in the 21st century without being reduced to
mere computational information processing? This master thesis is a speculative
reflection on our current and past methods of preservation of social history.
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AUTHOR: Maeva Bosko TITLE: Dream worlds SUBTITLE: What happens when we’re asleep?
Since my early childhood, I have dreamt a lot. Sweet,
pleasant or strange dreams, nightmares, sometimes even lucid dreams. Night is
when I escape to these virtual worlds. But what are these worlds? Why are they
so different from my ordinary waking world? I’ve even gotten to the point, on
various occasions, when I preferred these dream states to my everyday reality.
This is a research project into the world of
dreams as an attempt to decode the unconsciousness in relation to the virtual
universe and reality we experience at night.
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AUTHOR: Natalie Maximova TITLE: Walking the landscape, in video games
With a focus on
landscape representation in video games called “walking simulators”, this
thesis attempts to uncover questions related to a complex and ambiguous notion
of landscape, from its original conception to today.
During my
research, I applied the interpretive approach of “reading” and decoding
landscapes that have been used by geographers, as well as sociologists, artists
and historians. Video game landscapes could be thought of as a system
consisting of natural, man-made and cultural forces which can be identified and
studied. The landscape in this case plays as a medium that combines, holds and
channels these forces. If video game environments exist as part of our culture,
what kind of connections do these virtual spaces form? This thesis tries to
uncover processes behind the construction of the “natural” in video game
environments.
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AUTHOR: Joanna Wierzbicka TITLE: Why should our bodies end at the skin? SUBTITLE: Rethinking bodily matter beyond a humanist imagination
This thesis follows the turn to matter within
the fields of body studies, posthuman feminist theory, and new materialism in
order to rethink the definition of what a body is and, more importantly, what a
body can do. The main research objective is to find out how through questioning
the definition of a body and the use of metaphorical thinking in this process,
we can establish a more ethical living ground among other bodies.
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AUTHOR: Olivia Wünsche TITLE:
Myths shape reality
After having lived a deeply transformative
psychedelic experience, all previously held beliefs and perceptions which
conditioned my relationship to the surrounding reality, suddenly broke free
from the prison of mental programming and limited awareness. Different aspects
of this internal change manifested through an almost visceral connection to the
Earth. I started to direct my attention towards subjects revolving around
environmental and humanitarian crisis, simultaneously wanting to find the cause
that has led to our current state of separateness, in which we distance
ourselves from others and from nature. I understood quite rapidly that
socio-political problem-solving is undoubtedly urgent and indispensable,
however it remains shallow and incomplete by treating symptoms without curing
the cause.
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AUTHOR: Zhang Manqin TITLE: A diamond-shaped egg
This master thesis is based on different tools that
can be used to explore the power of memory. Closely related to the author’s
“I’m not a loner” photo installation, this research project combines fictional
writing with the documentary approach of a diary.
