Everywhere you go, everywhere you look, people are staring at their phones. Ivan Cash wants to know what they’re all looking at. So he asked them.
Cash has spent two years asking people to share the last photo on their phone and the story behind it. Surprisingly, people agreed. From Miami to London, Cash, video camera in tow, records their tales of everyday trivialities, triumphs and tragedies all documented through our screens.
"I ask people to show me their last photo instead of an ‘interesting’ photo because I don’t want it to be curated or filtered," he says. "The ordinary is way more fascinating, right? The ordinary is the extraordinary, that’s where the juice is."
The result is a series of eight short films all called Last Photo---one for each city---revealing dozens of deeply personal moments through the photos people snap without thinking.
Cash’s strategy is straightforward. He avoids the hippest part of the cities --- Valencia Street in San Francisco or Abbot Kinney Boulevard in Los Angeles --- in favor of working class neighborhoods. He finds the people there more open, and their stories more fascinating. He doesn’t canvass, but simply wanders the streets waiting to make eye contact or catch a smile so he can introduce himself. If someone says no, he doesn’t push.
"I really try to channel positivity and make sure people know that I don’t need anything," he says. "I never try to convince anyone and that helps people see that I’m being genuine. There is no fear about not getting enough people."
His most recent videos were shot in Chicago and Detroit. Like all his short films, each photo is a peek into someone’s life---a casino-themed birthday cake, a guinea pig returned to the pet store, a minister who saw an angel-shaped cloud. In Detroit, Cash found stories about the city as much as the people and their ability to endure. "I was really struck by this sense of optimism," he says. "No one was hanging their head."
The individuals Cash interviews take photos for a variety of reasons, and collectively they amount to more than simply an Instagram of the last thing they ate. Whether announcing an upcoming pregnancy or capturing homework notes, there's something surprisingly intimate going on. Last Photo is part of a larger body of work focusing on the intersection of technology and personal connection. Cash wants to add a touch of humanity to the digital exchange so people might think more critically about how we interact through our screens.
"We’re more connected than ever before, however I think that most digital technologies are conducive to breadth over depth and our interactions aren’t as intimate," he says. "So I’m trying to find ways to culture jam this technology."
https://vimeo.com/81688267
