Self Portrait

Daniel Green

Interview by L. Valena
March 31, 2024

Please start by describing the prompt that you responded to.

The prompt I received was a painting of an elephant, and the elephant was divided into lots of segments that altered the way the elephant looked. Each section was stylized in a way that showed different elements that make up an elephant, or what we know as an elephant. One section would be like the skeleton, one part would look like the muscles or the nerves or something, and there's a part of the top that was literally just pixels of the colors that we would associate with elephants. It was all different elements that make up an elephant.

When I first looked at it, I thought, “How am I going to turn this into a photograph?” But as I looked, I made this mind map and tried to work out what was going on with it. I homed in on the parts that make the whole, each segment being a layer of what makes an elephant an elephant. It’s that build of elements that make something, so I went along with that with my response.

And how did you do that? What happened next?

I decided I wanted to go out of my comfort zone with this and do something that I would never normally do. I was looking at portraiture, specifically self-portraits, because I’d never really bothered with that ever. And with that things-that-make-up-a-whole idea, I drew on my personal life quite a lot in my response. I'm currently a PhD student as well, sociology. Part of that is the social theory of Pierre Bourdieu and habitus, why people are the way they are, the external influences and status and taste and all that sort of stuff. I started to think about what makes me me. In the last two years, I've officially been diagnosed as autistic. I’ve known I’m autistic for a long time before, but now it’s official. Since that point, I’ve been making myself come to terms with that, living more openly as my authentic self through my autism. And the photograph that I created is an expression of that, stepping out of that light, but still being slightly obscured because that’s my style, the intentional camera movement. The response is just about what makes me me, and how many layers I have. It’s about stepping out and being more open, but still not as open as I would like because society isn’t at that stage yet.

I love that. I have so many questions. First, can you say more about this intentional camera movement, what that means and how the process works?

Normally, I would be doing it with landscapes or nature photography. It’s putting a filter on the end of your lens to make sure that you can open the shutter for longer and not overexpose an image. Then when you've got that long shutter speed, you can move your camera around and draw with the image that you've got. It must look odd when I'm on holiday and I'm trying to take these photos, just flinging my camera around wildly. Everyone must think I don't have a clue what I'm doing, but it creates this sort of Impressionist style of photography that I've not seen that many people do. I think it's a really interesting and unique art style that breaks away from photography’s expectations as technology has evolved. Technology makes sharpness and detail much more prominent, but with this you can use a cheap camera, just as long as you can control those settings and you have the filters. It sort of levels out economic factors so it's quite accessible for everyone.

That's awesome. You said you're sort of waving or flinging the camera around when you're picking a picture of a landscape, but you were actually posed in front of the camera in this piece. How did you do it for this?

In this piece, I had the camera set up on a tripod. The initial idea that I had was trying to layer some textured shots that I've taken previously on top. I tried that and it didn't really look how I wanted it to look. So I ended up getting an old photo frame and taking the glass out, spray painting that white and scratching it slightly, and holding that in front of me, between me and the camera lens. I set a long timer on and moved myself around behind that sheet of glass while trying to nudge the tripod with my foot. It seemed to work. It created that blur, that uncertain sort of image.

It sounds like it must be an amazing thing to witness! I love this idea of stepping more into your authentic self and trying to capture some piece of that. We're all on that journey, right? If it’s not too personal, do you want to talk more about how that's manifested for you?

The last two years have been quite a long process of change in my life over multiple different things. Starting this PhD is a life goal I've had since I was like 18. I’m 31 now and finally getting around to it. The autism diagnosis is another thing. Quite recently, I've accepted in myself that I'm bisexual. So it's this process of understanding myself better. There are these little trigger things that have given me more confidence: having a full-time job, getting on to a PhD course, finding more success with my photography hobby. All of these things just give me more confidence to explore myself more. It’s a journey of growth that will probably carry on going, I imagine.

That's wonderful. Congratulations on all of your progress. It's a big deal! I know it’s hard.

Thank you.

I’m really interested in this idea that you're expressing in this piece of what makes you, you. Do you want to talk more about how you view that?

From the composition of the photo, where I've overexposed the right-hand side and it's just pure white, I’d say that's me stepping out of that hidden part. Throughout my life I've always been the quiet kid, just keep your head down, go undetected, just do what you need to do, move on. But over these last few years, that's become less and less of a thing. I'm stepping more into a light where people can see me, making sure there's more of a focus on me and the things that I want to bring attention to. I’m trying to sow authenticity in myself and making it so it's acceptable to be part of a marginalized community for others too. But a large part of that is also in my PhD work. I don't see myself as a PhD researcher or particularly an artist, but as more of an activist in those roles. I’m in academic activism for autistic people and this was an attempt to move on to the artistic type of activism as well.

It sounds like your PhD work is informing your artistic process on some level.

Yeah, definitely quite a lot from the theories that I've been reading. I try to apply them to my artistic process.

If you were interviewing yourself right now, what would be the next question you would ask?

I would probably ask, “What do you hope someone will see from your work as a prompt?”

I would love to know! Yes.

Something personal. Something bringing themselves into it more. Having some sort of media or something and seeing if they could twist that self-portraiture in a different way that I would never think of because it's not my medium. I’d be interested to know how people using other media go about reacting to a visual prompt, because it's not something I've ever done before.

How did it feel responding to a prompt like this?

Quite a lot of uncertainty! I didn't know what to expect. I think before I got the prompt my head was like, “I bet I’ll be sent a poem.” [laughs] I had it in my head that I was going to be responding to some written piece of work. But then I got the image and thought, “Okay, I'll see what I can do with this.” And I think having that time limit definitely helped because I would have been obsessing for the whole two weeks about what that piece meant, rather than getting on with anything.

What is your advice for another artist approaching this project for the first time?

I would say to step out of your comfort zone. Do something that you wouldn't bother trying normally. Do something new, learn something new, and just have fun with it, really.

Call Number: R94VA | R96VA.greSe

Daniel Green is an autistic visual artist and photographer living and working in Kent, United Kingdom. He sees photography as an accessible art form, a great levelling tool in which those marginalised by society (by wealth, disability, race, age, sexuality etc.) can extend their voices and overcome the barriers to understanding between individuals. In line with this, he uses the technique of intentional camera movement (ICM) to portray his experience of environment and atmosphere, following Henri Cartier-Bresson’s notion by stripping away bourgeois concepts of sharpness from his work.