Research- Duane Michals

It seems far too obvious to look at Duane Michals while looking at text being used in conjuction with imagery, but he is rather good at it and I like the way he uses the text. The handwritten element is a nice touch and as a reader, I feel I can engage with it more. A lot of photographer have combined text and imagery, but trying to find ones using handwriting is a little harder.

Another reason I'm including it in my research is for the interaction between the subject and the work. Often it is them who are asked to submit the writing and what they want included and so it's interesting to see what Michals could get people to confess and allow him to reveal to others.

Often his work is narrative based and while I wouldn't exactly classify my project as that, the wishes I'm receiving and the morning experiment too are both telling me stories or snippets of them and they leave the rest up to the imagination and for the viewer to decide. A lot of what Michals is interested in is the subconcious part of our minds and how this affects certain questions. The human condition and exploring it are the main focus of his work and I feel that mine also slip into this realm with the way the project is going.

I've included several examples of pieces I like from Michals below:-