ten

ten (2010) I began this project with consideration to ‘vulnerability’ together with ‘restraint’, ‘discretion’, ‘delicacy’, ‘intensity’, ‘vibration’, ‘time’ and ‘duration’. Research explored nineteenth century speculation. Balzac commenting on the Daguerreotype supposed that all physical bodies were made up entirely of ghost like images and believed man was incapable of achieving something material from an impalpable apparition. He concluded that every time that a portrait was made one of the spectral layers was removed from the body and transferred to the photograph. My selection criteria is significant, aged ten, I have known these boys since their first day at school, watched them grow through learning and playing, winning and losing, laughing and crying. I am cognizant to knowledge relating to circumstances in their lives and I may read their comportment differently to another. These boys sat for me willingly on request, no smile was demanded, just to be still while the camera shutter was open. It is not necessary for the viewer to know of the considered vulnerabilities with which I began this project. There are many that would be relevant; rupture at home, concerns at school, desperation to move on, push boundaries and define independence, nostalgia for the nurturing security of the past, apprehension relating to forthcoming change of educational institution. All or none of these may apply but what is seen is the boy taken out of context; away from school, home, football, games, computer, music, tv, organised recreation, homework; deprived of any possession or place that might function to signify. There is a ‘psychological intensity’ in the self-containment of my models.I began the project with consideration to vulnerability and concluded with a realisation of exceptional formidability.. ‘the boy is a boy... ...what goes beyond is what you see when you know’ Ernest Hemmingway.