Anna-Rose McChesney (She/Her)
My practice is primarily concerned with ethnography, cultures and social studies of fashion. I try to use these themes to underpin the context of my work and base it in a social anthropological context.
Narrative image making is how I articulate my thoughts and feelings about the world I inhabit. I would also argue they are a concentrated, systematic type of enquiry into photographic storytelling. Additionally, a tool for analysing, albeit one that’s playful and pleasurable.
What’s Your Favourite Outfit To Dance In?
In March 2021, 200 young people participated in this photographic series. The project was born out of the excitement to dress up again. The COVID-19 pandemic was still taking its toll in Glasgow, and we were in our third lockdown. I was missing my dancing shoes, live music and art events, I saw this project as an opportunity to find the joy of performance and eccentricity that we had all been yearning for in lockdown. ‘What’s Your Favourite Outfit to Dance In?’ aims to capture the fashions and energies of the students in Glasgow. If people were missing dressing up and going out, they could drop me a line to be part of a unique project from the comfort of their own front doors.
The book was collaboratively designed with Tom Ive a graduate of the Communication Design course specialising in graphic design.
Title: What’s Your Favourite Outfit to Dance in?
Publisher: Anna-Rose McChesney, 2022
Graphic Design: Thomas Ive
Format: Book
Size: 18.5 x 23cm, 207 pages
ISBN: 9781399933858
When Shall We Three Meet Again?
I aim to provide alternative perspectives to traditionally villainized women in Scottish folklore through a triptych multi-media portraiture series. The three portraits are based off Mary Queen of Scots, the three witches from Macbeth and Niceven a fairy queen. Whilst working through a feminist lens, themes of female rage, power and beauty are explored. I combine drawing, photography and woodwork in my practice. I draw costumes, put them on myself, photograph them, green screen a drawn background and then woodcut hand drawn frames. These women’s stories have been told throughout history from an inherently patriarchal point of view, and I deem it important for me as an artist to shine a light on forgotten women’s experiences.
1000 x 800mm, birch wood, digital print.
To Be Adorned
‘To Be Adorned’ is a collaborative project between photographer: Anna-Rose McChesney and graphic designer: Billy Paterson. Together we have created a photobook containing 100 photos of people in outfits that they find meaningful in personal spaces in their rooms such as their bedrooms or living rooms. The book contains a foreword and introduction written by the sociologist Angela McRobbie and an essay by Martha Cruz.
Publisher: Anna-Rose McChesney, 2022
Format: Book
Size: 17 x 24cm, 200 pages
ISBN: 978-1-3999-5309-2
