This project is based on the West Midlands Police Force, more specifically Coventry. The piece’s objective so to represent the ways in which the local police officers protect, support and ultimately create a community. After completing research surrounding ways in which a community is created I began considering the local police force.  As I personally have not had any interaction with the police force, I thought I would investigate into the officers themselves as well as the local public who have interacted with this form of emergency service. 

 

Presented in a zine, this publication was distributed around the local community. This with the objective of putting the piece of work which I created back into its original community. The zines aim was to enlighten the public of the police officer’s contribution to society and their community as the majority of the feedback suggested their hard work went unnoticed and their contributions were predominantly positive. The use of a zine allowed me to reach a much wider target audience rather than a photobook which would have been much more personal and intimate. The final outcome ultimately allowed the boundaries of this publication to be pushed and a much wider audience was ‘enlightened’.

 

The concept behind the presentation’s structure within my final piece was to combine the portraits of the officers with personal statement’s surrounding their opinions of how they think they contribute to their community which was my initial response. However, I then incorporated landscape photographs of Coventry and finally statements from the public who have interacted with the police force. This presentation strategy combines the police force with the public to show their interaction with the community as well as other genuine pieces of feedback. The statements are hand written which is to maximise the intimacy which would have been present in a photobook. With this cohesion, the outcome of a zine can now be personal and widely distributed therefore achieving all objectives of the project.