Output details

Virus Portraits - A series of photographic portraits

Virus Portraits is a photographic series specifically commissioned for an exhibition which explored the creative conceptualisation and representation of viruses.

This practice-based research considers how contemporary photography can be used to explore the complex relationship between people and our understanding of viruses, in the context of photography being traditionally used to show us what viruses look like in medical science and medical humanities.

At the same time the work reconsiders the photographic portrait, building on Plouviez’s research into the photographic representation of women and explores the use of photography to make visible the invisible. The work also considers the cultural connotations of covering the lower part of the face, through the reference to the niqab and the conflicted positioning of the viewer to look at the face but at the same time have much of it hidden.

The surgical mask would be a common sight in some scenarios, such as a hospital, but is less so in the domestic environment, although it has been recently used both in relation to protection from the environment and self-protection from virus scares, such as SARS and swine flu. However a surgical mask is no protection against a virus, and as such shows only a hopeful attempt at self-protection in response to a health scare.

The series of 4 images premiered at St John’s College Oxford (10 September – 9 October 2011) in the group exhibition ‘VIRUS - Bad News Wrapped in Protein’ which brought together works by 12 artists and then went on to be exhibited at The Custom’s House Gallery as part of an exhibition looking at research-led art practice.

The work was publically sited on the Tyne and Wear Metro system, as part of the North East Photography Network’s photography festival ‘The Social: Encountering Photography’ (October-November 2013).