Liminal
London: Nikon D4
“Liminal space is an inner state and sometimes an outer situation where we can begin to think and act in new ways.”
Moments of negotiation hold a fascination for me.
Who do we choose to be when a threshold presents itself?
My photo is an encoded moment in a day on one of London’s glitziest streets. To approach the door is to assume an identity commensurate with considerable disposable income and a commitment to costly ephemera. To exhibit distant curiosity with a fairly chunky camera confers a different category; paparazzo, possibly? And yet, in this moment, our position is unresolved; what identity will we assume, and what projections or labels will be placed upon us?
It’s an interesting moment of confrontation which I’m determined to hold as I negotiate with myself. The often simple geography and creative potential of the liminal space seems clear, but what or who is emerging here? The temptation is to accept or impose resolution to relieve the anxiety of uncertainty, but the potential for creative dialogue or conversation collapses as our experience is named, classified and allocated.
Author and Coach, Nancy Levin asks, “How do we honour the space between no longer and not yet?”
Whether as individuals or part of organisations, our capacity to spend time in this liminal space reflects our potential for genuine transformation rather than ‘managed’ change. So, today, as we negotiate our emergence from pandemic, rather than fall too easily for the language of ‘return’ or ‘normality,’ I wonder if we might live with the question of who we will be for just a little longer.
Whether physical or psychological, liminal spaces feel uncanny, they unsettle us, and holding them open, as we patiently examine our perception and experience, often feels provocative or radical. So I wonder how we might face the political reality of liminality? How do we act to hold spaces open and wait for the tender, delicate signals of transformation?
And who is served as the space closes?
Photographing absence is a tricky proposition, as is seeing into the unseen or listening for the unheard.
Yet fascination feels like my guide.
Notes:
I don’t subscribe to any organised religion but Richard Rohr’s excellent daily meditations offer regular, thoughtful provocations and challenges for ‘contemplative activists.’
Apparently Ferdinand de Sassure is one of our most quoted linguists, which is remarkable as he hardly published anything. Yet his ideas laid the foundations for structural linguistics, the notion that language actually structures our experience of life. As a photographer, I reach into his work through Roland Barthes who elaborated on Sassure’s ideas of the ‘signifier’ and ‘the thing signified.’ Barthes’ ‘Camera Lucida’ is a seminal examination of themes of presence and absence in photography.
Finally, for a ‘trip on the verge of reality’ you might enjoy a scroll through the Liminal Spaces of the @SpaceLiminalBot on Twitter
