Essaying Place: Time and Landscape in the Essay Film

This practice as research thesis explores the representation of place in the essay film. Place and landscape are frequent subjects of the essay film, films that often form through, and in response to, encounters with the spaces of the world. This thesis seeks to shed light onto the essayistic representation of place through exploring the structures, make-up and experience of places and landscapes and through the application of theory from the field of geography. I establish what I call an essaying of place in order to describe the processes and outcomes of an approach to cities and landscapes through the essay film, one in which the complexities and multiplicities of place come to the fore. Central to the thesis is a focus on temporality in a consideration of place and in developing an understanding of the relationship between place and the essay film. I produced two film works that both take an essayistic form in an approach to representing place and landscape, embodying the theoretical research and expanding this research through creative production. My practice approaches the spaces of England through the essay film, where travelling acts as a film production device, as a research tool and as a method of putting into practice an essaying of place. The process oriented nature of a practice as research project positions filmmaking as a key element in understanding my work as a practitioner alongside the wider research into the essay form.