ESCAPE THE CORPORATE WORLD

Its a working title

Hello, and welcome back to another edition of Tuesdays with Adam. Today, I want to take you along with me as I start shooting a new series. Aussie Kulture is still on display, but for now, that chapter has been firmly closed, with a bookmark wedged inside in case I decide to revisit it one day.

Escape the Corporate World actually came about while shooting my last series. One image that didn’t make the cut was the original plan: a man standing in a suit on top of a pontoon in the middle of the ocean, holding a map of Australia upside down. This shot right here.

Did the shot pan out exactly as I had hoped? Actually, yes, spot on, to be honest. I had planned many of these elements and timed it so we could shoot as the sun was rising, and we did. After shooting and playing with a few ideas, which I also enjoyed, the guy on the pontoon (my friend Jesse) said to me, “The water looks so inviting.” Of course, it was; it was January in Perth, and the water was crystal clear. So, we decided to try and get a frame of him mid-jump.

Now, the problem with this frame was that I ABSOLUTELY LOVED IT. So much so that I didn’t use the planned shot in my current exhibition so I could save the new shot for my next one. Before I show it, I want to explain my idea for this exhibition. The frame happened on a whim, but it unlocked something in me that has led to me shooting eight images for this new series already.

So, what made the image so special? Well, by the degree on my wall, I am a graduate of commerce with a specialising in accounting and finance, but I never worked in either field because I knew it wasn’t for me before I had even graduated. The idea of being in a world that required so much of my time, for something I truly didn’t want to pursue, was bizarre to me. So, I stepped away before I even put my second foot in the door. Why is this relevant? I believe this was the door that got opened when I shot the first frame of this series. Let's consider some truths I believed and still do about the corporate world. Within the structure, there is obviously a huge time commitment required to make it work. You’ll mainly be based in an office location within a city, and you will wear some form of suit or suit-like outfit. These are my common visuals when I go for a wander with my camera through Perth city. So, this has led me to set up frames with certain characteristics I wanted to carry all the way through the series.

The series being called Escape the corporate world is an obvious one I hope for what I want people to get from the frames, there are some characteristics I want to tie together in each frame to showcase this.

First, people in suits—that's a must in terms of the “corporate world” for me. Second, nature is the majority of the frame. Third, I don’t want to show faces.
I read a quote about René Magritte’s famous painting of a man with an apple, and someone wrote that it’s “as if the individuality has been taken away from them in order to conform.” I liked that and carried it through this series and continue to as I shoot it. I want people to relate to the people they see in the frames by taking away the face it could be me, you or anybody who feels something when they see these images.

With all of this in mind, I would love to finally showcase the image that inspired this series in the first place. This is JUMP