I researched Michelle Sank after finding her through the British Journal of Photography.  Sank’s collection where the collection My.Self is portrayed (Warner, 2018).

The collection was created by Sank by simply approaching young people in the area of Sandwell and asking to photograph them in their bedrooms.  I think that Sanks, as a woman, was perhaps more able to make such a proposition than I would be as a white, middle aged man, but I think the result is fascinating.  

Sanks (2018) says “What’s on their walls is a metaphor for their identity and personality” (Warner, 2018).  I found reviewing the images that I spent a lot of time comparing the person’s clothes to the décor of the rooms and in doing so, making up what type of person they really are.  I found that the greater the degree of incongruency there was between the subject and their surroundings, the more I would make up about their character. 

In Figure 1, I think there is a high degree of congruency between the subject and their room and so my story was quite brief; I see Mahyer, a young man, with a slight middle eastern look to his face, some of the artefacts seen in the room reflect that –  the bed cover shiny and gold, the mirror with the golden frame.  The congruency means that I do not make much up.

In Figure 2, there is a big difference.  The subject, Maurice, is a well-toned young man with a serious expression on his phase, one that tries to look ‘hard’.  He is, I make up, proud of his physique which is why he has chosen to pose topless.  In contrast, his bed is adorned with soft cuddly toys.  I make up that Maurice is insecure and so needs his comforts at home but has developed his external persona for public consumption in order to disguise that.  Maurice’s room also looks to be the brightest and well-kept so I make up that his family is reasonably well-off, this is reinforced by the box on top of the wardrobe which is for Hunter wellington boots, an expensive brand.

Learning

• Fact versus fiction – It is interesting to me that the pictures are factual, they are not constructed, but because of the set up, I spend a lot of time making up a story about the person.  I have been reflecting recently about my struggle to move away from facts, and my need to control how the viewer will see the images.  The photographer here has got all the facts needed in the setup to the set and this is enough to then leave the viewer to make up the rest.  It’s a very good example of how to manage the boundary between fact and fiction. 
• Typology- the set is a good example of typology but it is interesting to see how Sank has allowed the subjects to pose themselves.  The full set of images is available on Sank’s website (Sank, n.d.), and it can be seen that all the images are taken in the bedroom, the setup of the project, and therefore nearly all the subjects are next to their bed.  But even so, they are all posed differently, I make up that they themselves chose how to pose.  That said, there is still enough consistency between the images to make sure that they fit together a cohesive set.  My learning here is that for typology to be successful, the images don’t need to be exactly the same, and in fact, allowing differences and latitudes can actually create more opportunity for the viewer to make up their story.  
• Contrast – this set is quite in contrast to my review of Aubrey Wade’s ‘No Stranger Place’ collection (Wade, 2016) whose images were all posed exactly the same, and used long captions to leave little for the viewer to make up, Sank simply providing the name of the subject.  The learning here is that one does not need to try too hard to shift between fact and fiction, open and closed.  Sank’s use of the artist intent rather than captions, and the latitude she has granted to the subjects to pose themselves has created a dramatic difference to the way in which I view the collection.  In fact, trying to hard probably has the opposite effect.

Bibliography

Warner, M., 2018. Michelle Sank’s Portraits Of Young People In Britain’s Black Country. [online] British Journal of Photography. Available at: <https://www.bjp-online.com/2018/11/michelle-sanks-portraits-of-young-people-in-the-black-country/> [Accessed 13 July 2020].

Sank, M., n.d. My.Self. [online] Michellesank.com. Available at: <http://www.michellesank.com/portfolios/my-self> [Accessed 13 July 2020].

Wade, A., 2016. No Stranger Place. [online] No Stranger Place. Available at: <http://nostrangerplace.org> [Accessed 7 June 2020].

Figures

Figure 1. Sank, M., n.d. Mahyar. [image] Available at: <http://www.michellesank.com/portfolios/my-self> [Accessed 13 July 2020].

Figure 2. Sank, M., n.d. Maurice. [image] Available at: <http://www.michellesank.com/portfolios/my-self> [Accessed 13 July 2020].