Zemni Images

Linda Mayoux Creative Notes for Activism

Zemni Images

Losing things is about the familiar falling away.
Getting lost is about the unfamiliar appearing.

Rebecca Solnit ‘A Field Guide to Getting Lost’ 2005

‘This question of whether something is fact or fiction
is a reduction of the bookends with which we live our lives’

Walid Raad 106 Infinity Award

My creative work explores interlinkages and overlaps between the ‘bookends’ of my personal responses to places and events and a more political ‘voice’ and activist approach to social and environmental documentary.

Creative image-making and writing are necessary for my own process of making sense of life in our sometimes beautiful, but often insane world. 

In my ‘parallel life’ as global consultant in participatory development in Africa, Asia and Latin America I meet many wonderful, inspiring people. I see stunningly beautiful scenery – human rural and urban landscapes as well as ‘wild natural’ remote environments. I also see many shocking examples of violence, exploitation, environmental degradation, waste and powerlessness. 

The more I travel, the more questions I bring back about life at home  – where are our ‘developed’ lives trying to get to, why and at what cost? My image-making is a way of working through the darker side to come out the other end and ‘look on the bright side of life’.

Underpinning all my work is an interest in narrative and interlinkages, complementarities and conflicts between ‘subjective’ and ‘objective’ perspectives, and how to navigate the inevitably infinite range of creative possibilities to create images and narratives that can in some ethical sense ‘make our world a better place’ and reach people who do not have the resources and privilege to buy ‘quality work’.

I work in a range of still and moving image formats in a range of media combining photography, drawing/painting, printmaking, digital media and writing.

Some of my work is experimental, exploring different media and effects in response to a wide range of briefs.

Alongside my own artistic practice I support processes for collaborative art, photography, video and web communications as part of peoples’ own documentation of their lives.

  • Graphic Design

  • Photography

  • Moving Image

  • Art Illustration

  • Printmaking

  • Words Words

abstraction activism Afghanistan Africa alphabet animation appropriation black and white blobs book covers book design British calligraphy cartoon children China collage colour conceptual art conflict constructivism dada design cultures designer design history design movement design movements documentary drawing drypoint environment experimental typography fanzines feminism feminist gaze film French futurism geometric Greed Game history identity illustration illustrator image and text imaginings ink Iran Islam Islamic Islamic design Islamic modern Islamic traditional design Italy Japanese Design Japanese traditional design journey landscape largescale late photography letterforms line London modernism modernist modernist movement monoprint narrative natural forms New Topographics painting paper pen personal philosophical photobook photography photojournalism photomontage political psychogeography publishing satire Saudi Arabia stop motion street sublime text and image typographer typography history typography style United States urban US video war Western design wildlife woodcut