Bound

In Bound, Josh Gaskell explores the ironies between physical and theoretical restrictions. The title embodies this irony, its multiple meanings encompassing confinement in its adjective form and movement when a verb. The project is Gaskell’s reaction to ongoing Covid-19 travel restrictions, designed to keep people local. Despite this, Gaskell experiences no physical boundary on his local area, with roads allowing free travel, functioning indistinguishably from their original design. 

Differing places captured with a uniform observation; Gaskell’s eye height reinforces his perspectives relationship with the work. The aesthetic aims to convey a nostalgia Gaskell has for the places photographed. The documentary images observe invisible ironies and are only fully understood when the images contexts are learned. Gaskell’s images, therefore, highlight the importance of temporal context for the space reproduced within his images. When applied, current temporal context breaks and polarises the typical signified meaning of the roads Gaskell photographed; these places are currently boundaries. Distinctly, these boundaries are not landscapes or spaces, they are places defined by people and impact those who may or may not move through them – thus demonstrating these restrictions are sensations, as without people the boundaries would not exist.