CarolineDeVries

Boarded-up pub windows, signs of bankruptcy, forced removal or relocation; metaphor for abandonment, ruin and urban decay. The emptiness behind them is being paradoxically blocked from the passer by.There is no access, no visibility.
The skyless framing reinforces a sensation of claustrophobia. What happened or who lived here? Something dramatic or sad took place or this is only an inevitable precursor of regeneration and gentrification?

There is also an intentional uncertainity which emanates from the portrait. At first sight, without caption and juxtaposed with the ‘Dead window’ it could be mistaken for a mugshot and evoke sinister narratives... As you see the glass reflection and note the formal pose, you realise this portrait is in fact a close-up of a studio shot; although his location in the windows of East London hair salons is not obvious. In the same way that the window is deprived of his context, this portrait is also without identity.

We are in front of facades and masks, visible but inaccessible. Are these image supposed to be aesthetic hair model or also representations of British youth? These image is chosen and placed with generic intentions, but without a universal beauty, it become icon of local taste.