Suraya Raja

Suraya's work focusses on engaging with people over social and environmental issues. From this research led practice, she develops a wide range of work, using video, photography, print and photography.

Previous work includes a video of three dolls interacting with a tricycle - apparently innocent toys, but which have a sinister undertone of uncertainty.

Surarya also created a video, working with people who claim to have pyschic abilities. She made sets to be able to re-construct events, and introduced her own ideas, challenging notions of authenticity that are expected within a documentary. She created short slow moving pieces on dreams and meditations, to be viewed lying on the floor.

She is using this bursary to develop her ideas around the manipulation of documentaries. She plans to create model sets and interventions that will challenge our notions of the 'natural' environment, and to introduce unexpected interpretations to familiar settings. She is particularly intrigued by the many processes of destruction as well as preservation that comprise the management and restoration of the habitats on the site.

Suraya has created a website, on which she is documenting the progress of her work during her residency. It contains several images of the sets that she has been creating. It also invites visitors to add their comments - on the special history and atmosphere of Thorne and Hatfield Moors, or on her work. Please visit and add your comments!

www.transformingviews.org

On Friday 22 July there was a display of Suraya's work - video clips, website, photos, sketch books and models - at the offices of English Nature in Wakefield.

For more on this event, and images of the ideas and issues that Suraya was exploring during her residency see suraya