My work is comprised of conceptual portraits: I locate a theme or phenomenon and then find subjects and environments to demonstrate this theme. All of my work explores identity, mimicry and stereotypes; specifically, I play with the social and psychological forces that shape and influence oneâs identity. I try to connect my photographs to the history of art, linking contemporary people and practices to the past by employing techniques that reference classical portraiture. Through gesture, lighting, size and formality, my images recall artists such as Vermeer, Manet, Renoir, Paxton and Sargent and pay homage to the original purpose of portraiture: the glorification of the individual, the family or the subjectâs role in society.
In Constructed Identities I explored how, as we embrace our adult identities, we become like actors on a stage playing a part. Each community to which we belong is like a different âscene,â with its own set and wardrobe.
Through Imitation delved into identity and gender as the product of cultural and social influences. Throughout our lives we imitate the individuals with whom we identify, often appropriating those traits, mannerisms, and qualities we most idealize. Photographed in the homes in which they were raised, drag queens Truly Fabu & Andorra Tette appropriate the cultural stereotypes of the world in which they grew-up - espousing the costumes and poses of their mothers.
In my current project, States of Union, I use the genre of portraiture to expand societyâs understanding of family, giving historical background and social credence to the validity of family life among the gay community. By drawing upon â and loosely referencing â classical images, the tropes historically used to promote heterosexual family units are re-appropriated and reinvented to serve a more expanded view of family. Seeing portraits such as these in public spaces shifts not only the subjectsâ perceptions of their own identity, but also the viewersâ conceptions of the definition of family.
I use the medium of photography, but manipulate the image in order to evoke the genre of painted portraits. However, while the genre of painting is referenced in order to link the images to the legacy of portraiture, the choice to use the medium of photography plays upon our cultural assumptions that what is seen in a photograph is a record of fact. Thus, linking the photographs and the subjects to present day society.
