Research- Tom Hunter

Tom Hunter is another British photographer that I found out about from looking through old copies of Portfolio. I could feature quite a bit of his work as most series have something relevant that I could link in but I'll just focus on a couple.

The series 'Persons Unknown' is the one I saw first. He says he uses everyday folk, no celebrities and no-one extra special. The photographs come across as capturing a private moment and as though the subjects were totally unaware of his lens, which is effective, but I doubt this is the case. Something I noticed straight away with the series is the use of windows. There is a window in most of the images and in a lot of cases, the people are gazing toward it or out of it. I like the symbolism and that the viewer can decide whether this is a gateway into exploring the person or a way of showing the person is trying to view and understand the outside world. Perhaps the window symbolises a sense of being trapped or the stare is a search for a way out.

Insignificence and a feeling of being lost seem to be two of Hunter's interests when making the series. The subjects are people that ordinarily wouldn't require a second glance unless you knew them and this is the case so much with people and the way society is going. When I was viewing the images and then reading text about the subject, I started to think that perhaps it was exploring that fear and anxiety about our impact on life and 'leaving our mark on the world' that I think all of us worry about at some point. These kind of worries and fears are something most of us can identify with and a suggestion that although we vary in our likes/dislikes and personality, we all share things.

The project largely explores the feelings that we all share even though the hows and whys may vary:- Fears, hopes, desires, anxeties and so on.


Another one of his series I also like. It's similar to the last research I did in the sense that it doesn't feature people. It's called 'Empty Towerblock Series' and it's more like the ghosts and memories. Abandoned towerblocks of flats that people once called home are now nothing but shells, though all carry evidence of life and of being lived in. Some it's the decoration, some the items left behind. All imply an identity once which has since moved on. It's the air of leaving something behind.

I seem to be evolving with areas I'm looking at rather than where my initial ideas were when I started the project. The theme is still identity and exploring personality, but perhaps how i want to achieve this has altered. This project I really like because I looked at each image and started to imagine who lived there and where they are now. It's open to the viewers to decide this and that element of mystery I like. With some, the narrative was helped by some of the items still in the flat or the decoration. This goes with stereotyping, something we've all been brought up around and do almost without meaning to. It's the need to label something and have to know about it.

Hunter has several more relevant series. Most look at people and identity. Sometimes that identity has been given to them by the media (in the case of the series Ghetto Series) and sometimes it's one that people want to have. I like his approach to exploring it and I find it very inspirational.