Gaze

Intro:

In this project, I printed photographies of my parents to 1-1 scale. Showing how do they look like while viewing us. I put these photos on the cameras in our yard to create a fair relationship between people under surveillance and people behind cameras.

It was scary at first. Even though we know the photos are hanging there, we would still be shocked when walked out from the studio. I found this reaction is quite interesting. Maybe we ought to feel scared when people unseen are looking at us. For most of the time, we almost forgot that our lives are under surveillance, but is this right?

Intention: 

There are cctvs in almost everywhere of our yard. My parents put them there to protect our properties and ourselves. The situation of our yard reflects the situation of the society we are living in. CCTV is always a critical object to talk about. Coming along with the sense of security it offers, there also lies the lost of privacy and potential danger. 

And the action of surveillance doesn’t offer a fair relationship between people under surveillance and people behind cameras. People behind cameras can see the people under surveillance but people under surveillance can’t see the people behind cameras. How about we offer people under surveillance the power of knowing who’s watching them and how do they look like while watching them.

Background:

In this micro brief, the context is in our yard, my parents are people who’s behind the camera and we are the ones under surveillance. My parents place the screens beside their tea table. They would look at what we are doing while drinking tea.