“Free Fotolab” (2010)
Phil Collins
MoMA-PS1
In this project English artist Phil Collins invites anyone and everyone to send in their undeveloped 35mm color film rolls to him. In exchange for the free development of their film the senders must sign away all rights of the images to Phil Collins. The result is a slide projector display of image after image after image of people’s private lives and other various snapshots that were chosen based on criteria unknown to the viewer. Standing in the dark room as the curious images came up one after another in a seemingly random order I was struck with the similar sensation of perusing someone else’s Facebook album. When I was in the room there were many other young people that were there, and they had reactions to every image (mostly laughing), and then an image of a very old man in a hospital bed came up and the room was silent (until someone commented on the silence and people laughed once more). So, in many senses it was like a public viewing of a randomized Facebook photo album, where comments and reactions were encouraged, but once this particularly boisterous group of kids left, and the room was once again silent and I was left with that same feeling. That this is wrong. That Mr. Collins is exploiting the lives of these people who willingly signed the rights of their images over with the promise of their pictures being chosen. Although issues of appropriation an obvious issue in this piece, I was much more interested in the relationship between the piece and the viewers. In any case the piece certainly had a lasting impact on me.
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