Equivalents, 2009 - present (ongoing)
Equivalents is an ongoing series of work where as an act of collage, I use Polaroid film to re-photograph found imagery found in advertisements and catalogues.
Using the simple gesture of cropping, the image is stripped of its original meaning and context and becomes an open landscape for an abstracted narrative. These works focus on visual moments of intimacy, memory, sensuality and tenderness found within pre-existing commercial images that are typically cold and unrelatable, intended for sales rather than connection.
"Equivalents draws the intimate onto the corporeal, creating landscapes of the body. Close-up images of skin, the crevasse of a collar-bone, soft angles of the neck are moments of sentimentality identified within magazine editorials or advertisements. The body is constructed through illusions of touch, evoking sensory memories and intimacies. Contrasted with image of glossy magazine landscapes, the physical barrier of the photograph interrupts the instinct to immediately connect with signifiers of closeness. The viewer is removed from their intimate associations by Russell’s process of selection and the materiality of the photo."