I displayed my mugshots in the seminar space to see how they work as a group. By showing the portraits together I wanted to intensify the feeling of anxiety. The women I have portrayed seem to connect as they all expose personal private dramas with their expressions. Dorothy may seem different because she is fictional, but the strange beauty of the 1920s mugshots makes the images theatrical. These women are dressed in finery more suitable for an evening out, than a prison cell. My work is about storytelling – I am telling tales in pictures with an assortment of imagined characters.
I wish I could have made more ink drawings as a larger group of portraits would make more impact, but this is something I can still work on. Perhaps I will bring the nurse portraits into this set of work, I’m not sure yet. The Easter break will be a good time to stop and think about how I want to progress.
My tutor suggested I research Physiognomy. Physiognomy is looking at the physical characteristics of a person’s face or body to make a judgement about their character. This could be really interesting to research as Charles Dickens, Charlotte Bronte and others have used physiognomic descriptions when writing about an individual’s persona in their books.
Photographs of the mugshots displayed at university.
Here is a short film I recorded on my mobile phone of the display of mugshots.
