Capturing Suburbia

This conversation, hosted by photographer and publisher Matt Dunne, was held inside the home at 43 Anderson Street, Werribee, as part of [AT HOME] Wyndham. Participants Ammar Yonis and Rachel Morley exhibited photographic works in the exhibition Suburban Views.

Matt Dunne:

I just want to start by saying, we're in a house. Let's make it conversational. You don't have to wait for allocated question time, if Ammar or Rachel are saying something and you want to hear a little bit more, just let us know. Don't feel that you need to wait. I think we'll all be appreciative if people are chatting to us as we're chatting to each other and to you as well. So I just want to start with a really basic question and just ask you both to tell me a little bit about the work you've got here and what it's about and how you made it. Just give us the overview of what's going on. Ammar, your work is closest to us, so I'm going to ask you to go first. Tell us a bit about it, man.

Ammar Yonis:

So in the sunroom, I believe there are four images. Three are from a series. That was me trying to capture the moments in my childhood where I thought bonds of family were being created. Growing up my mum used to just meet these friends and then she'd take me to their house and I'd have to just mingle with their kids. And then when I look back, a lot of the long-term friends that I have is they started there in those kind of moments, just watching a movie in the living room, playing cards with them and their cousins who might've been over at the same time. And so through that series, those three photos, I was trying to capture those moments. Sharing food together, watching TV together, just passing that time, even doing homework after school at some house that I met for the first time.

I do remember that fondly and I wanted to capture that through those images. And there is also one image that was part of my most recent body of work, which was called 'Out of Bounds'. And that was more about how in the suburbs I feel like there's nothing to do sometimes; in that image, it's my friend chasing the bus. But in the series there's a lot of other things like jumping fences to playing nice basketball courts and things like that. That series was me kind of just showing how I felt, and a lot of my friends felt the same, that there just wasn't a lot of activities or social hubs for us to access. So we were always looking for things to do on our own, coming up with places to visit, games, or hanging out in random areas.

MD:

Rachel, your work's in the hallway. Can you tell me a bit about it please?

Rachel Morley:

So it's from a larger series that I photographed all in one street around the border of Hoppers Crossing and Tarneit, called Kingston Boulevard. And I guess similarly my work comes from a place of having grown up in the area and Werribee, it's where I spent most of my life. But I didn't grow up in this street. It's more of a sort of outward looking view of the suburbs, I guess looking at houses and what they look like. And for background, I had been living out of Wyndham, in Geelong and Melbourne for a couple of years, but I moved back here last year in July due to a little housing crisis. My rental was sold and I couldn't get another place. So these photos came from an experience of being back here in Wyndham where I grew up living with my parents again and sort of experiencing the streets and houses and suburbs from a totally new perspective and wanting to understand what's happening here.

It seems to have just rapidly changed overnight in a way since I was a kid. But also the same way, these houses, they're 20, 30 years old and I guess there are some childhood memories of visiting someone who lived in that street. They're all really deluxe houses, really, really wealthy families lived there, which is so beyond my experience. And they always fascinated me as a child. I thought they were beautiful, these huge staircases, they look like palaces with their huge lawns. And now I kind of look at them as this symbol of excess in a way, and inaccessibility and also just quiet emptiness and surveillance and yeah, they're really a bizarre thing. I think Wyndham overall has a great community vibe and these places don't speak to openness and community at all. So hopefully that summarises where those images come from.

MD:

It's funny, when I was driving today, I took the exit from the freeway and right on the exit there's this absolute palace.

RM:

Oh, Duncans Road.

MD:

Yeah. And the fences are 15 meters high or something. There's something so crazy about just building a luxurious home in between two on-ramps. I don't know if it happens anywhere else in the world but Australia.

RM:

Absolutely. But I think these places, similar to what you were saying Ammar, about there not being that much to do in the suburbs; people build bigger and more extensive private residences and huge backyards and some people have whole playgrounds in their backyards. You can see them peering over the fence and it's like, well yeah, there is a lack of public spaces and things to do and people are also paranoid that their kids are going to get taken off the streets. That was a big thing for me growing up, not really being allowed out on my own that much for better and for worse.

MD:

Something both of you just mentioned was growing up around in different parts of Wyndham, and something I was really curious to ask you about was, what do you feel is similar or different from maybe when you think of your childhood and when you look around today? I'm assuming there's been a lot of changes, but maybe that assumption's wrong. So I'd sort of be curious if you notice any similarities or differences? Ammar, you kick off, bud.

AY:

I mean, I feel like growing up because I felt like there was nothing to do, it was just pick up friends and ride our bikes and then it's sunset and it's time to go home. Maybe I was younger, I didn't have money as well, but now working and stuff so obviously if I want to go out for dinners, movies, that's more easy. But I do feel like growing up it was just houses being built, Tarneit was expanding. Now we have Eagle Stadium, which is amazing now, and I feel like things have been popping up centers and whatnot, but I always felt like I had to travel if I wanted to do something, if I wanted to play soccer properly, I'd be going to a park somewhere else or someone would be taking me to a road trip somewhere, like family and relatives. I remember I used to text my cousin, every time there was a league game, 'Can you take me? Can you take me?' When you're younger maybe there really isn't, like you said, the parks in the background. I feel like now they're starting to put a park in the middle of new houses, but back then it's like even if I wanted to go somewhere... every 40 minutes for a bus, you just give up. Just stay on the block and find something else to do. With age, I can drive so it changes everything. But I do feel like we still could do better.

MD:

I got a follow up, which I think Rachel will have a lot to say about. Do you think inherently as a kid you just find where you grow up kind of boring after a while? Do you just get a bit sick of it, even if you lived in the most wonderfully publicly accessible dreamland? I dunno. Do you think you'd just get bored of it as well?

AY:

It's all relative, I guess because I look at my cousins that grew up in the southeast and I always felt like they had something to do. You know what I mean? I felt like they always had something going on, why don't we have it here? But then they also have a kind of, see now if there's something going on, all my friends will drive separately in the west. I don't know why we do that. We live next to each other, we all drive separately, but the southeast, they'll take an hour just to pick everyone up and go together. So when I look back, I want that, but it's like now it's in our nature, we just, I'm going to be here at six. Okay, you rock up at six and everyone's there. So maybe it's relative I guess.

MD:

Alright. Lot to talk about Rachel.

RM:

Yeah, lots to talk about. I guess jumping off that, I'm going to say I'm quite anti-car and it's really hard to be anti-car in Wyndham. It's almost impossible. I got my license this time last year, so I've been driving for a year now. it's a matter of great shame for me. It feels like I gave up on my dream when I was 15, 16, 17. I was not a very good cyclist, but I would cycle to school. It took me half an hour down Derrimut Road. But yeah, that was a big sense of achievement for me.

Similarly I feel like, yeah, Wyndham, I mean you do inherently find a lot of things about where you grow up familiar and therefore not as exciting. But I have actually found a lot of things in this past year because I've been forced to look at it in a different way and find what is good and beautiful about it. There's a lot of really great conservation groups. There's a really great community around the natural environment here. I think in terms of public transport, really efficient buses every 10 minutes on major roads would really transform how we navigate the suburbs and what people do around here. And for kids, obviously if you can't drive, you're just really, really restricted. And frequency means safety as well. I'm really getting onto a lot of points here, but when people talk about children's safety and public spaces, it's like, 'Well they can't take the bus, there's strangers on there'. But what's worse is waiting at a bus stop 30, 40 minutes by yourself. It's a huge thing and has always been a huge thing for me. When I first moved to Tarneit in 2012, looking at my mum and dad to confirm, so 11 years ago now, we had one bus route that kind of skirted the edge of our estate. So it was a 12, 15 minute walk to the bus and that went every 40 minutes in a big loop around to Hoppers Crossing station.

MD:

I know the one. And the bus driver after the sixth route is just like, 'I'm not even paying attention.'

RM:

And if it was running late, I didn't have a smartphone back then. I had no idea, my dad would just drop me at the station sometimes, which is great. But I think just the way that affects everything about this place, everyone complains about traffic and as you know, if something happens in Wyndham, an arts project, people are like, 'Why is council spending money on the arts when we need better roads and more car parks?' It's a mindset that I think is hard to avoid in the suburbs, but it does affect everything.

MD:

Just ironic because there's so many roads in the west in particular; public spaces are dominated by big roads, trucking routes, freeways, and yeah, it makes driving between places easier, but it also sometimes makes the public spaces a little bit less pleasant sometimes when you have to cross a six lane road and it's not even a freeway to get from where you got off the bus to the park, or whatever.

RM:

Yeah, absolutely.

MD:

You were saying, I'm sorry if I'm paraphrasing badly, but you were talking about coming back to the area and starting to find things that were more interesting or beautiful. Do you find as an artist you're trying to make work and that almost opens places up? You have maybe a different view because you're kind of working artistically? Or do you think just naturally you're just a more mature, grounded person now?

RM:

I think I'm a really curious person and I think having, I guess a camera, I love it. You've always got something to do with your hands when you're walking around. Yeah, walking and cycling and moving. I don't really drive to do photography if you like. It's sort of a way of being present for me and observing. I guess for me a big thing is people; that kind of makes me meet more people and intentionally meet people who live here. Most of my friends do live scattered around Melbourne, around Geelong. So finding a central community, a regular community encounter or group is quite difficult. So yeah, I think as an artist you really do have to make community where you are. And that sort of drives a lot of what I'm doing at the moment here.

MD:

I dunno if either of you ever had this experience where you're walking or you're on public transport or you're driving and you go past the most boring shit heap and you're like, 'This is the best thing I've ever seen. Every part of this construction site is just amazing. I have to jump this fence.' Maybe that's just me. But I fin if I'm in artist mode, I'm like, 'Oh, that incredible fishing hook caught on that fence, simply beautiful.' Whereas normally if I'm just going work or whatever, I'm like, 'Somebody should clean that up.' Do you find that Ammar? I think maybe you and I work a little bit differently where you're recreating things, so I'm not sure if it's the same for you.

AY:

I guess there is a nostalgia to the work I make. 90% of the time I'm 'clean that up'; but I think when I'm in the mode of creating work, that's when maybe the construction... I'll be like, 'Yeah, you know what? There is a lot of construction going on.' And then I'll start to be like, 'What does that mean about the area? It doesn't mean we're growing, it doesn't mean they are making stuff that's good for us, for the community. Is it just building so we can get more money? I don't know. So I think I do switch off when I'm not creating work and I'm just living, but when I'm in the mindset of putting work together that kind of tells a story, that's when I really start to think about the things around me.

MD:

So let me ask you a question about how you make work. Some of your photos look like you could have just been sitting back on a couch, mates are playing a video game and you take a snap or your friend's running for the bus and you just happen to have a camera with you. Are you setting things up? Or are you just bringing a camera along to see what happens?

AY:

I kind of have a storyboard of the images we want to take. And it's kind of like I'll tell them, 'All right, this is what's happening', and I recreate that moment or direct it a bit. For example though, the one of my friend chasing the bus, that was... he thought of that on his own really. I was taking photos of them at the bus stop sitting on the curb, and then the bus actually came and he started running. But It looked really good. And you have the shadow of him behind the bus as well. And I was like, I didn't even have a chance to look through the eyepiece of the camera. I just had to quickly take it. And then when you develop film, half the enjoyment is that you get to see the photo you took and it turned out really well. But for example, the photo in the living room, I set it up, we waited for the sun to actually come through the window, so it got that warmth in it. And then we took it. We sat around for maybe half an hour waiting for just that right moment.

MD:

Hold it, hold it, hold it, hold it.

AY:

That's why they started playing cards. And then the sun finally came through and we took the photos. So I would say most of it is thought out. It's like scenarios at least, even if it's not like a storyboard. But then obviously along the way, there's inspiration.

MD:

And Rachel, I'm guessing you don't build the house that you want to take a picture of. How is your process, for this work at least, similar or different?

RM:

It's interesting because unlike you, I don't really take photos of people unless they're my friends, snaps of people. I think the unpredictability or maybe the awkwardness of directing someone is something that, in the back of my mind, is a barrier to that. I am usually just documenting stuff, I don't always plan. In this instance for Kingston Boulevard, I did. The first time I saw the street was looking at it in terms of thinking about doing it as a project. I was driving on my way to a doctor's appointment and I was cutting through there to avoid traffic because it was totally empty most of the day. Then I returned there on my bike with the intention of taking photos. But in general, that was the first time I'd really documented Wyndham, I guess with the intention to show something that wasn't around construction or destruction. It's interesting you mentioned that before because I used to just take photos of houses and pretty things in other suburbs, the northern suburbs or in Melbourne, photos of old architecture – that was something I was like, 'Oh, people want to see this. I want to see this. This is beautiful.' But the first time I took photos in Tarneit, or maybe it was Mount Rell, it was an abandoned house that was just unfenced. It was semi-demolished. And I spent an afternoon there about five years ago photographing that, and I just –

MD:

Hoping there's no asbestos.

RM:

Praying. And that was really interesting. I guess that's where I started thinking about what this house meant. It was one of those dream houses from the eighties, from a similar era, and it was just being smashed up for a new development, which... there's lots of ways to think and feel about that, but just seeing someone's dreams and their orange trees in the yard... it's like, yeah, I guess it all comes to you. There's nothing that I could dream up to be an instigator.

MD:

When you're taking a picture of someone's house, has anyone ever been like, 'Why are you taking a picture of my house?'?

RM:

I did wonder about that. I debuted a show at the Annex in Werribee earlier this year, and a real estate agent came to the opening night who manages some of the properties on the street and she wanted to suss out what was going on. I was chatting to her and I was like, 'Oh yeah, it'd be funny if someone caught me on the surveillance camera. I'd love to see what that footage looks like.' And she was like, 'Oh yeah, all of them have surveillance cameras, they've all seen you.' But no one really questions you, I guess.

MD:

It makes you wonder what's the surveillance camera for.

RM:

It's paranoia.

MD:

Can we talk a little bit about the actual exhibition in a house? We're sort of making work a little bit about suburbs and homes and what's that all mean? I'm kind of curious, have either of you ever exhibited in a house or domestic space before? Is this kind of a first for you guys?

RM

It's a first.

AY:

First for me, yeah.

MD:

How does it feel? Was it interesting thinking about?

RM:

It's interesting because that abandoned house that I was taking photos of in 2018, at the time I thought, 'Oh, I'll come back here and I'll invite all my friends and we'll put our artworks up on the walls.' But when I came back it was demolished already. So it was kind of interesting to get the chance to come here and do it in a very council approved, very safe way. Asbestos, maybe not, maybe yes. But yeah, I thought it was a cool way of, I guess uplifting non-traditional exhibition spaces as well. There's that sort of feeling of, 'Oh, your art is made valid by exhibiting in a white cube in an inner city suburb.' But I think having it out here is a really cool way to contextualise the works.

AY:

I think just having it in a house and in Werribee also invites... exhibitions in the city, you have generally a certain type of people that come. So I feel like this feels more inviting as well. More people might feel intrigued to actually come and see the exhibition. And then also the theme that we have for the work I think is very fitting for our house as well. So I think it does really add to the experience. And even, at the opening night, you'd bump into someone in the hallway and be like, 'You know what? I'll go around [with you].' And so it just feels more homely as well. You're just kind of forced to speak to people a bit more, the smaller the space as well. I've really enjoyed seeing this exhibition in a house. I feel, for me, it sets a benchmark for house exhibitions.

RM:

It is interesting. I do know people who in an effort to dodge gallery fees, they do open up their share houses to big group exhibitions. So it's a nice tradition, but obviously this is kind of thinking about planning and design as well, and architecture, which is really cool. And yeah, I think more people should open up their homes since we don't really have, or not every suburb or region has a community gallery; so maybe it's a good format.

MD:

Yeah, I think it's nice. Something that a few of us were talking about before we started talking was just like, I don't know, sometimes when you go to a big gallery space or whatever, and it's the same layout as the one here there, Sydney, Adelaide, wherever, it almost makes it harder to be creative because you're not actually responding to anything. You're just like, 'Oh, I've got a white wall.' Whereas a place like this, there are parts of the room that are dark or there are parts of the room that are this really lovely 70s teal. You actually have to think a little bit more creatively, but in a way it's also more familiar. None of us really, I hope, grew up in a sterile white warehouse just pummeling down with the worst lighting ever. So actually this is more maybe what we're used to.

One of the themes that the curators came up with was around suburbs and representation. I'm sort of curious, what are you trying to represent in your work? Are you trying to represent other peoples' stories or the experience of a whole place? I know that's kind of a big broad maybe how do you answer that kind of question, but I figured I'd ask and see where we get to. Ammar?

AY:

I mean, with photography, I've always felt that it's an opportunity to tell a story. And I think the most important thing for me would be to tell a story that I would understand, that makes sense for me. So I've always tried to recreate moments I experienced, things that I think are important in my community, but what I've found is that other people definitely resonate with that as well. And then that's a point of exchange. We can discuss things that we experienced growing up as similar. I feel like everyone has had those moments where they're creating bonds with other people. So I guess it just adds a channel for me, but I always kind of just try to represent what I know. I don't really try to, I guess, create something that I'm not that familiar with because I feel like just creating the work that I do, then I get to have that conversation with those people that do understand where maybe a different realm or a different community that I haven't engaged with myself wouldn't. So do I actively think about representation? Probably not. But I think I'm already making stuff I understand or things I think are important. So in that sense, I probably am trying to represent something from my understanding.

RM:

It's interesting. The word representation has such a big political meaning right now. I always feel like I'm in a bit of a battle with the word representation. I think it is a helpful word. I think when it comes to talking about my own work, I struggled to find any use for the word representation. I guess if I was to talk literally about the word representation, I guess I'm representing my own perspective and views, but all I'm really doing I guess with photography is I'm taking a photo of something that I want to talk about. So for me, it's more like a conversation starter. I don't feel like representation of, if we're to talk about who I am and my identity, there's not a lot of value in that, in sort of saying, 'Oh, I'm representing the view of someone who grew up in the west who is a woman,' or whatever. To me, that doesn't matter. But yeah, I guess if you're saying rather that I'm just presenting something that I see and wanting to talk about it, it's not like a finished idea or the final endpoint, then yeah. The final endpoint is somewhere in the future. The goal of whatever I'm trying to do sort of happens once other people are interested in talking about it with me. I guess it's vague, but I guess that's good because I leave it open.

MD:

Rachel, you've kind of alluded to it a little bit, and Ammar, I'm not sure if it's something that you think about a lot or not, but at the moment in Melbourne, there is a lot of precarity around homes and where people can find homes, especially for renters. And I know you guys have been making work around suburbs and home for a long time, but has that increasingly pointed issue started to influence the way you think about your work or what you're trying to get at with your work? Or is it sort of something you're aware of but that's not really coming into the work itself?

RM:

Definitely. The housing crisis has just made me more interested in the suburbs, if you like. It's kind of this thing, I can't get away from it, every day of my life it's thinking about where I'm at. And yes, from my perspective, but also broadly, people who have less mobility in terms of finding a place to live, moving around, you can feel very trapped by the cost of housing, renting, buying, whatever it is. But even talking to other people about how their choice of where they live is determined by this market and by these forces and landlords.

MD:

So when you walk past a house that could almost be a suburb, are you just kind of like, 'Jesus Christ'? For me, I think I get a little bit snarky very quickly where I'm like, '20 people could live there, dude."

RM:

I try not to be a hater. But I am at heart. That is my immediate response. So I guess I look at those big houses and I'm like, you know, maybe you're empty nesters and you're just taking up all this space and you've got a room full of trophies and a room full of basketball caps or baseball caps, that's what people collect because I've been inside the houses of people who have a whole room for a pool table... it's a trophy space, you know. It's a badge of wealth and power. And I think, yeah, there's got to be a way to talk about it in a way that's not condescending or judgmental.

MD:

Because it's also peoples' dreams, isn't it? I mean, that's where it gets hard.

RM:

Yeah. But I think we should all question our dreams. Why we want what we want.

MD:

Okay. Getting deep on a Sunday.

RM:

Yeah. But I guess going on from that project that I've been doing, taking photos of the outside, I do kind of eventually want to chat to the people who live inside. That real estate agent gave me her number. She said I could get in touch with those people if I wanted to. I guess it'd be interesting to hear what they think about housing and why they chose to live in a place like this. And I guess get that other perspective. Are they just clout-seeking wealthy people as I imagine them to be? Or is there something else to find a common ground there? I don't know.

MD:

What about you Ammar? Does this stuff come up in your work or is it really just separate?

AY:

Here and there. Me and my mum will talk about buying a house and then it's expensive and the conversation will fizzle away and that will happen every four or five months. But do I think about it in the work? No, not really.

MD:

You can't make work about everything. What do you think about in your work? Is it mainly just trying to come back to memory and nostalgia?

AY:

Honestly, I would say although the work is planned, once I have the idea, the idea itself really does come out of nowhere sometimes. It might just be a conversation that me and my friends are having a lot more. We might be like, 'Damn, why isn't there anything to do next weekend?' There might be something here.' So I feel like the ideas, I don't really know where they come from, it's just what feels important in my head at that time.

MD:

I was sort of talking to my mum – I'm a bit older than both of you – I was talking to Mum about how, it's weird to say, but maybe one of the greatest gifts of the time and place I grew up is how boring it was. Because you're like, 'What am I going to do?' I might as well just invite a friend over and then we'll get the Casio keyboard out that we got 10 years ago and just see if we can make a stupid song. That's an afternoon. Where if there was actually more external interesting things to do, you wouldn't have just sat in the garage being like, 'How do you make a drum machine work?' Or, 'Oh, this computer's kind of slow. What if we just tried to break it and put it back together again?' Or, 'What if we moved the trampoline close to the shed and we could jump off the shed on the trampoline?' And that's actually a really fun thing. My mum was always like, I can't believe you guys didn't kill yourselves. But that kind of boredom, in a way, drove ... I don't know. You don't want to be bored, but it does get you somewhere sometimes.

AY:

I agree with that. It does make you think, 'What can we do?' We have to do something. I feel like we came up with a lot of games as well, and now if you told me to come up with a game, bro, I don't have the time and patience to come up with a game for you. But I feel like growing up, we actually came up with brand new games. If you drop the ball, we kick it into you. There's a game. 'You guys want to play that again?' 'Nah, let's think of something else.' So I feel like yeah, the boring does inspire you to think of other things to do, to make the most of your surroundings.

MD:

Yeah, definitely. Were there any questions from the audience?

Audience Member:

So just listening to you all and having grown up in the seventies, we also had a drive to find things to do. And growing up in the west, there was still limitation on our spaces – hubs, parks, etcetera. We really didn't have a lot in the area that I grew up in, which was Spotswood. So observationally in Wyndham, even in the early stages of living in Wyndham, the park spaces were pretty limited and they were pretty vacant, they weren't utilised. And this whole sort of super dream large upscaled housing, I think represents exactly where families were trying to create these spaces for their children, for their families; their entertainment spaces, with an element of safety. 

And people paid to send their children to various activities after school. Rachel, growing up, and her sister; we had a limit financially and also time-wise, but we wanted them to explore playing in their own space, interacting with children, imagining creating those types of things rather than going and doing this class Monday, this class Tuesday, this class Wednesday, and having a busy lifestyle. So I think now we are seeing, certainly in the Tarneit area where we are because of the type of demographic and different ethnicities, we are seeing a lot more people being outward, and the development of parks and facilities in the area has actually driven that even further. So we see more cultural activity happening and more community involvement too. 

So I guess I see your work as actually more related than what they might appear on the surface, because Rachel you are looking at a consequence of some of the changes that occurred through the excesses, and Ammar you are looking at your experiences and lack. So I kind of see hope within the community because of some of the things that are happening, but there’s obviously still a need to further drive back to more social engagement, more thought around those spaces. Wyndham can do better, much, much better because, comparing to other municipalities, they're only at the beginning of providing what we need in this community, and things like [AT HOME] – amazing. I read a little bit of the chat that was a result of the Facebook or Instagram promotion for this particular exhibition, and some of it was just ridiculous. People commenting on the lighting and not really taking time to read about what it was. I reckon a huge proportion of those people would face some of these struggles with housing. Some of them would be facing increased rent, some of them would be forced to prepare to constantly have their place ready for open houses where the homeowners are selling; this type of thing. But they're all just whining about what they see on the surface. So we need more conversations like this and we need them in places that are accessible like this, where people are given the opportunity, like, ‘Are you struggling with this? What do you want for your community?’

Audience Member:

I'll ask a very quick question, and it's just about the pace of your arts practice. I see both of you are shooting on film; what is it about the duration of making the work?

RM:

I love shooting on film. I don't know how to use a digital camera. It's chemicals reacting to light. It has a material reality, whereas pixels, the ISO is fake. I don't understand how you're meant to engage with that. It feels like the most real way of doing photography and it's like a nerdy kind of thing as well. I started developing my own film and doing darkroom printing. It's very hands-on. I mean, these works were digitally printed, so maybe that's not relevant here. But I do think that the process of developing it yourself and seeing it come up; it does feel like you've really got ownership over what you're making.

AY:

I mean, because I don't shoot a lot, I'm always trying to tee up an exhibition or something or some kind of partnership so I know if I make this body of work, I can put on display somewhere. For example, with ‘Out of Bounds’ with Hillvale, that took a year. I did reshoots of some photos that I wasn't really happy with because film… it can come out like, ‘Ah.’ But it is a bit of an ongoing process – and then suddenly you have to exhibit it on this day. 

RM:

That's kind of amazing how long it takes. I didn't realise.

AY:

Yeah, I mean, especially when you're trying to refine it again and again. But I think if someone tells me in two months we're going to exhibit work, then it's two months. You don't really have the luxury of time. With film though, I think if we had developers in Werribee… film labs and just film rolls somewhere for sale [it would be different]. The fact I have to go into the city to develop and to buy film and to borrow equipment, that does add more time to it.

RM:

That's interesting. On two points. I really want to open a film lab if anyone wants to fund it. But yeah, you obviously have such a long process. I do everything at the last minute. I mean, I say it takes longer because of film, but I'm doing everything at the very last minute. My process is quick but slow.

Simon Robinson:

I'm going to wrap it up with this question. Just following on with that though, I'm interested in the future of your both art practices and the use of photography. Ammar I know we were chatting the other night, you are starting to head into film, which makes so much sense when you talk about storyboards, telling the story, setting up scenes; and Rachel, your practice is photography, but it's text-based as well. And I wonder if you are going to start to integrate that into the storytelling of some of these photos.

RM:

Yeah, well it's interesting. Writing has always been in the background. But in August I did a story writing workshop led by Ammar, and that kind of sparked that interest again. And the text works on the billboard [‘Signals’] are part of an old project. I guess that's something I really want to work on. Poetry and short stories. Photography and photo collage are just an ongoing slow experimentation with new ways of doing that for me. 

AY:

I mean I think at the heart of what I'm trying to do is tell story and photography is just more accessible than making a film. At uni I took film electives and I really was interested in making films, but I didn't study film. I just didn't know people and whatnot. Photography, I guess it's like, I can just have my camera take the photos. I don't need to rehearse scenes and have a whole crew. But now I am transitioning into filmmaking because I do have more experience. I've worked on sets, so I kind of now know what I need to make a film. And I've made my own now actually; a short film, less than 10 minutes.