Bodyscapes (father)

I decided to try a new subject for my close-up body studies. Thinking that it would be good to go for a very different type of body – I asked my father to be a model for me. He is in his 70's and so there were some strong alterations in the subject matter and hence images, from the work on my body. 



View the set here.

The shoot went well – lighting, framing, focussing were all successful. But I felt uneasy, I felt like I was exploiting my father, particularly when I would choose sensitive areas of his body, areas which showed his age, and aim to make interesting ambiguous images of them. The problem with these images was that they could potentially be viewed as repulsive, and I was aware that I was choosing them for that reason. Not because I wanted to present my father in a negative light, but because I wanted images that would have dramatic effect on the viewer, and all of a sudden this didn't seem fair.