I Like the Nightlife, Baby!
I wanted to explore the relationship between the performers and the audience; the bond between the entertainer, actor, performer (the doer) and the one who merely watches or observes (the voyeur). What makes a person fall into one category or the other?
While the rest of society is usually sleeping, one group is "strutting their stuff" for the gratification and amusement of the other. The "doer" and the "voyeur" share in a sub-culture that only occurs after dark, on the fringes. As a photographer I was clearly aware of the role of the voyeur while documenting these events. And yet I felt the need to perform, the desire to seek approval from my own viewing audience, so that in the process of exhibiting my work I fulfilled both roles.
Edward Weston (1886 - 1958) whose work I admire, summed it up quite succinctly: "How ironical that we pay others to dance when we should be dancing, to sing when we should be singing".
These photographs are from my solo exhibition in Brisbane as part of the Pacific Fringe Festival in 1993.
While the rest of society is usually sleeping, one group is "strutting their stuff" for the gratification and amusement of the other. The "doer" and the "voyeur" share in a sub-culture that only occurs after dark, on the fringes. As a photographer I was clearly aware of the role of the voyeur while documenting these events. And yet I felt the need to perform, the desire to seek approval from my own viewing audience, so that in the process of exhibiting my work I fulfilled both roles.
Edward Weston (1886 - 1958) whose work I admire, summed it up quite succinctly: "How ironical that we pay others to dance when we should be dancing, to sing when we should be singing".
These photographs are from my solo exhibition in Brisbane as part of the Pacific Fringe Festival in 1993.
