Paper short abstract:

Covid Collage Chronicles is a visual ethnography of the Covid 19 pandemic using collage. I will concentrate on portrayals of breath in medical, political protest, mask-wearing and leisure contexts and on the use of water and fire language in political rhetoric.

Paper long abstract:

Covid Collage Chronicles is a visual ethnography of the Covid 19 pandemic, undertaken from May to December 2020. It consists of two hundred images, made from cut and pasted magazines, collected and recycled using collage. Collage functions using appropriation and aesthetic distancing to cope with a large range of input and therapeutic as well as chronicling purpose. Several of the collages explore connections between the anthropocene and the pandemic, including zoonotic transmisssion, air and water quality changes, and perceptions of nature. The idea of the fifth element, aether or quintessence as a combination or alchemic transmutation of the elements (akin to the god’s breath, presence or the life-force) comes back into imaginative play and projected anxiety during this period, with this invisible, barely understood disease. I previously worked for years as a cinematographer where lighting and composing the elements and weather patterns as part of narratives has been a substantial focus. The materiality of collage as a process is different, and the paper, glue, board and the small size of the works is important. I will concentrate on the portrayal of breath in medical, political protest, social media and mask-wearing and leisure contexts, and on the use of water and fire language in political rhetoric. Responses to this work in the form of social media and online exhibition will be outlined through changing notions of social life and responsibility during the pandemic. I draw on Luce Irigaray and Trinh T Minh-Ha’s characterizations of air and water.