Derby Graduate Showcase 2012

Lauren Spencer’s piece Uncollectables: A Museum of Being formed a personal, beautifully thoughtful and intelligent exploration into the concept of the collection and the notions of transience, the unattainable and intangible.

The photographs that make up the collection - ripples in water, birds in flight, wisps of cloud or fragmented light on a surface - are moments of passing, moments which cannot be grasped or kept. Yet Spencer has managed to save and keep these ‘non-physical’, ephemeral moments through the act of photography and placing them into a formal, physical collection. Spencer speaks of this process as, in a sense, a form of escapism - a subtle signification of a futile longing for freedom the mundanity of everyday life and the trappings of material possessions, meanwhile addressing the human idea of ownership and our desire to possess, control and own what we do not.

For myself, something that I really enjoyed about the piece was it’s physicality - to view these transient and intangible moments within the collection you are forced to interact with a physical, tangible object. I found this only increased my yearning to experience, to own these fleeting moments, which, admittedly, reflects this human desire to have what we cannot Spencer eludes to.

Website: www.laurenspencer.co.uk