A never ending debate in my work is whether local or global narratives supercede each other. Are all humans and societies fundamentally similar? Or are they all fundamentally different?
On the face of it, there is no way that any culture, society or person can be quite like any other, since their present condition results from the impact of untold millions of purely local and subjective factors. On the other hand, there is no denying the fundamental similarities either (genetically, all humans on the planet are virtually identical).
I love photographing street signs - after all, they are symbols designed to distill a complex idea into as simple and universal a representation as possible. Here, I have used a collection of pictures of street signs to reflect on the conundrum of local and global.
I say Glocal
ReplyDeleteYou'll be interested to know that the specifications for the stop sign were established as per the Vienna Convention on Road Signs and Signals. Yes they actually had a convention to the universalize road signs! Imagine riding on the BQE at 65mph and having to deal with deciphering US specific road signs. But then again the potholes on the BQE serve as good enough stop signs.....
ReplyDeleteBQE is not the best example me thinks. On the BQE I dont think anyone reads the road signs - you just sort of keep going and see what happens...
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