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Playground by Mette Reitzel |
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Playground is a photographic essay about mass entertainment with special focus on adrenaline-fuelled activities and simulated environments.
Of Danish birth, Mette travelled extensively and had a fling with anthropology before settling down with photography in London 4 years ago. She is currently preparing her next series about what could be described as the ultimate form of mass entertainment: tourism.
A seemingly basic human fascination with danger runs through the history of entertainment. From gladiators to trapeze artists, entertainers have risked their lives for the pleasure of the voyeur.
Mass entertainment also engenders a sense of belonging, alongside a chance to socialise and escape the mundanity of everyday life, satisfying the basic need of interaction.
Playground explores the accommodation of such instincts through technology in modern entertainment. Technology simulates danger while avoiding real risk and it reconstructs beautiful landscapes via machines and screens to be admired like a romantic sunset.
The raw, black and white aesthetic goes underneath the hi-tech, neon-coloured surface of fun, fun, fun and shows a sinister and emotional side of mechanical entertainment.
Edited into a cinematic narrative the documentary images become a real-life horror show or, if you prefer, a visual poem about the loneliness and vulnerability inherent to mass culture.
'Playground' is a limited edition of 200 copies.
It is currently available at Zwemmer Media and the Photographers Gallery in London, Whitworth Art Gallery in Manchester and the National Museum of Photography, Film and TV in Bradford, UK. |
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