A bent toothbrush, a pipe, a trashbag, an engagement ring, perfume bottles… A photographer and social scientists sought out objects that focus on decision-making for people described as suffering from mental illness.
How can a decision be made when the person in question is described as being incapable of deciding for themselves ? How can their perspective, and that of their friends and family, be taken into consideration? How can it not be taken into consideration? In each case, the dangers the person faces, as well as the dangers they put others in, have to be weighed up against jeopardizing their freedom.
The perception of these dangers makes a difference. What are acceptable risks, unacceptable ones, and for whom ? Each decision brings into play a combination of experiences, knowledge, perceptions and norms. These “marker objects” beckon, signal, allow stories to be told that are intertwined with the lives of those that suffer, those that care for them, those that love them and live with the uncertainty.
Colour photographs
All rights reserved, Jean-Robert Dantou and Florence Weber
[Bio c. 2014] Jean-Robert Dantou: French. Born in 1980, living in Paris. His work led to several exhibitions and to a number of publications on subjects like contemporary China (« Ombres Chinoises », ed. Atlantica 2004), the french cooperative sector (« Ceux qui aiment les lundis », ed. Le Chêne 2012), or the french small and middle-sized companies (« Mon entreprise prend la pose », ed. Democratic Books 2010). He divides his time between french institutional commissions and artist residencies. Artist-in-residence at the École Normale Supérieure of Paris since 2012, he collaborates with an interdisciplinary social sciences research team. http://www.agencevu.com/photographers/photographer.php?id=325...
[Bio c. 2014] Florence Weber: Professor of Social Anthropology and Sociology at the Ecole normale supérieure, Paris (Centre Maurice Halbwachs), she published a dozen of books and more than 100 scientific articles, mostly on ethnography, the history of social sciences, kin theory, household and informal economy, Alzheimer’s care-work. Since 2011, she directs a project on mental health, social disqualification and disability in France, devoted to psychiatric patients’ biographies: their everyday life outside of the hospital, their social and civic rights, their relations with healthcare-workers, other paid care-workers and informal caregivers. http://www.loeildelaphotographie.com/2014/11/17/exhibition/26633/mois-de-la-photo-2014-jean-robert-dantou-at-ens-objets-sous-contrainte Research: Florence Weber, social anthropologist (Ecole normale supérieure Paris,...
The Bureau of Memories: Archives and Ephemera is a thematic reflection on the archive and its discontents. Washington’s identity as the seat of American political power is amplified through its role as the locus of its own memorialization. Where there is history, there is haunting. By drawing on the archive’s unnerving, uncanny, and ephemeral specters, this exhibition is an effort to re-imagine and reposition archives as sites which not only have the capacity to produce and contest historical memory, but also generate significant gaps and blind spots.