Mark Curran | The Breathing Factory
This exhibition from Mark Curran began with a 9 month battle to gain access to the Hewlett-Packard Technology camp. The project started April 2003 and ran for 20 months. It featured workers in uniforms leaving everything to blur into the background, except the diversity of their employment. Curran's work on this project is said to explore themes of culture from the individual - as its the only thing that shines through the standardization of the camp (coats, uniform creating a neutrality comparing to human kind).
The image of Mick, the Line Operator really helped me to understand the greatness of this project by Curran. We rarely see what happens beyond the shell of these corporate testing buildings, and too see how a blending individual from the outside world contrasts within the plainness of this camp. He all of a sudden may seem full of character because he's not dressed in white. The portrait of Ebelonga highlights how much of our personality/emotion the human face carries. We are able to recognize her human characteristics but that of her body blends away with a corporate wash.
The image of the Worker from the Leixlip, Ireland is my favorite from this selection of images. The noise in the image creates a tension between the viewer and subject - he looks as though hes about to begin a technological surgical operation, staring direct in to the viewers eyes. He is dressed in such clinical attire, which would be likely to help the thought processes of their employees in to the corporate mind sets. I.e. Hewlett-Packard are a worldly renown company so their staff must perform like machines, hence the removing of color and stimulation.