Peer Reviewed Title: Traces of Austerity, or The Writing on the Wall Journal Issue: Streetnotes, 25 Author: Vanderwees, Chris, Western University Publication Date: 2016 Permalink: http://escholarship.org/uc/item/3c7398mr Author Bio: Chris Vanderwees is a SSHRC Postdoctoral Fellow at Western University and a therapist in private practice at the Avenue Road Psychotherapy Centre. He is also member of Lacan Toronto and of Gallery 44: Centre for Contemporary Photography. Keywords: Toronto, Trace, Photography, Street Photography, Documentary Photography, Graffiti, Sign, Inscription, Austerity Local Identifier: ucdavislibrary_streetnotes_26065 Abstract: In this series of photographs, I document, juxtapose, and recontextualize graffiti, signage, and written messages found in Toronto’s downtown core through 2013 and 2014. I approach each image, each captured inscription, through the political and ethical demands of the trace and as communicative of other traces. Photographs in this series are meant to stand alone, but are also recontextualized through their associative connections to a larger and continuously expanding narrative that conveys marks of socio- economic inequality, difference, and privilege in times of austerity. In this sense, each photograph expresses an imminent ethical demand through the traces of unknown others. This series ultimately aims to identify existing conditions for potential collective struggle through aesthetics of the other’s inscription as a political proposition. These images stage an affective and aesthetic encounter with the language of the other and the traces of that language, encouraging the viewer’s engagement with possibility and difference beyond dominant ideological actualizations that unevenly distribute power and privilege in contemporary life.
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Supporting material: Smile you are on camera Jennifer Dawn Bishop Beavon The Messiah Earthquakes on Earth if War Does Not Stop Now Payless for everything Nightmayor on Ford Street Will I be able to work? MYEXPAID Stop Line 9 Native Pride We Sue Stop whispering to me from your vehicles the police won’t do anything about it. That’s why Death by Fun The difference you can feel Don't Give Up Tout est possible Everything is fine keep shopping Tell Your Mom Woe to the oppresor Hurry!...Time is…Short Soul? Feel how afraid he was To the loved ones of Derron Earle We are sorry for your loss A modest memorial Government Problems Intelligence Wealth Health Education Self Sufficient Choice Good Family Social Bad Corruption Status Delusion False Happiness Oppression What can I do for you? Save the Arctic Thanks for nothing Because nothing relly mattress There’s plenty of time my darling Are we not still young + easy? Don’t Shout Copyright Information: All rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. Contact the author or original publisher for any necessary permissions. eScholarship is not the copyright owner for deposited works. Learn more at http://www.escholarship.org/help_copyright.html#reuse
eScholarship provides open access, scholarly publishing services to the University of California and delivers a dynamic research platform to scholars worldwide.
Streetnotes (2016) 25: 153-161 Section II: Mosaics of Spectacle and Resistance
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ISSN: 2159-2926
Traces of Austerity, or The Writing on the Wall Chris Vanderwees Abstract In this series of photographs, I document, juxtapose, and recontextualize graffiti, signage, and written messages found in Toronto’s downtown core through 2013 and 2014. I approach each image, each captured inscription, through the political and ethical demands of the trace and as communicative of other traces. Photographs in this series are meant to stand alone, but are also recontextualized through their associative connections to a larger and continuously expanding narrative that conveys marks of socioeconomic inequality, difference, and privilege in times of austerity. In this sense, each photograph expresses an imminent ethical demand through the traces of unknown others. This series ultimately aims to identify existing conditions for potential collective struggle through aesthetics of the other’s inscription as a political proposition. These images stage an affective and aesthetic encounter with the language of the other and the traces of that language, encouraging the viewer’s engagement with possibility and difference beyond dominant ideological actualizations that unevenly distribute power and privilege in contemporary life.
Author, First. “Title”. http://escholarship.org/uc/ucdavislibrary_streetnotes
Streetnotes (2016) 25: 153-161 Section II: Mosaics of Spectacle and Resistance
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ISSN: 2159-2926
“[A]t those times when we have an experience of being overwhelmed, it is not simply a question of making sense of it, of giving it a meaning, but just of making an inscription….It is less about making stories than about making marks” (Leader 44).
Here, I present a selection of images (Fig. 1-10) from 2013 and 2014 that are part of a larger street photography project where I document and juxtapose graffiti, signage, and other written messages found in Toronto’s downtown core. Each image captures the fleeting inscriptions of others who echo broader cultural anxieties and political concerns that stem from economic austerity and inequity. These photographs are meant to stand alone, but are also recontextualized through their associative connections to a continuously expanding personal project that captures markers of socio-economic difference and privilege. The inscriptions depicted in these photographs undermine narratives that posit capitalism and the state as bearers of progress, rationality, and protection. The images also reflect cultural pessimism, the loss of faith in the neoliberal state and capitalist system to provide for its citizens, and the growing sentiment that the end of the world is immanent. Many of the images present ethical or political demands through the marks of the other who is absent at the time of exposure, but nevertheless remains present in the photograph’s traces. I intend for the images to produce an affective and aesthetic encounter for viewers through the other’s production of speech in writing, a speech act, which makes a certain call for recognition from the viewer. This project aims to identify existing conditions for potential collective struggle, but directs this aim through the aesthetics of the other’s inscription as a political proposition. Ultimately, these images stage an encounter with the language of the other and the traces of that language as a form of resistance, encouraging the viewer’s engagement with possibility and difference beyond dominant ideological actualizations that unevenly distribute power and privilege in contemporary life.
Author, First. “Title”. http://escholarship.org/uc/ucdavislibrary_streetnotes
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ISSN: 2159-2926
Fig. 1. Vandalized construction sign/Bloor Street West, Toronto, Canada, 2014. Photo credit: Chris Vanderwees.
Fig. 2. Man reads headline that reports the scandal of Mayor Rob Ford’s use of crack cocaine being caught on video tape/Dundas Square, Toronto, Canada, 2013. Photo credit: Chris Vanderwees.
Author, First. “Title”. http://escholarship.org/uc/ucdavislibrary_streetnotes
Streetnotes (2016) 25: 153-161 Section II: Mosaics of Spectacle and Resistance
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ISSN: 2159-2926
Fig. 3. Graffiti echoes George Bush’s comments following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks where the President urged citizens to confidently and continually participate in the American economy/Broadview Avenue, Toronto, Canada, 2013. Photo credit: Chris Vanderwees.
Fig. 4. Advertisement expresses fears of unemployment in an increasingly competitive and unstable Toronto job market/Yonge Subway Station, Toronto, Canada, 2014. Photo credit: Chris Vanderwees
Author, First. “Title”. http://escholarship.org/uc/ucdavislibrary_streetnotes
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Fig. 5. Written message on a cement wall/Dundas Street East, Toronto, Canada, 2014. Photo credit: Chris Vanderwees.
Author, First. “Title”. http://escholarship.org/uc/ucdavislibrary_streetnotes
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ISSN: 2159-2926
Fig. 6. Graffiti made by children from the Dundas Junior Public School/Dundas Street East, Toronto, Canada, 2014. Photo credit: Chris Vanderwees.
Author, First. “Title”. http://escholarship.org/uc/ucdavislibrary_streetnotes
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Fig. 7. Man on the 501 streetcar to Neville Park/Queen Street East, Toronto, Canada, 2013. Photo credit: Chris Vanderwees.
Author, First. “Title”. http://escholarship.org/uc/ucdavislibrary_streetnotes
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Fig. 8. Written message in chalk refers to the decline of sea ice in the Arctic as an indicator of radical climate change/Bloor Street West, Toronto, Canada, 2014. Photo credit: Chris Vanderwees.
Fig. 9. Deronn Earle [sic], 31, was fatally shot while leaving a Moss Park apartment building in Toronto’s community housing projects Queen Street East, Toronto, Canada, 2013. Photo credit: Chris Vanderwees
Author, First. “Title”. http://escholarship.org/uc/ucdavislibrary_streetnotes
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Fig. 10. Young woman outside the Eaton’s Centre/Downtown Toronto, Canada, 2014. Photo credit: Chris Vanderwees.
Works Cited Leader, Darian. Stealing the Mona Lisa: What Art Stops Us from Seeing. New York: Counterpoint, 2002. Print.
About the author Chris Vanderwees is a SSHRC Postdoctoral Fellow at Western University and a therapist in private practice at the Avenue Road Psychotherapy Centre. He is also member of Lacan Toronto and of Gallery 44: Centre for Contemporary Photography. Email:
[email protected]
Author, First. “Title”. http://escholarship.org/uc/ucdavislibrary_streetnotes
