You Know We Were Matched on a Very Special Day
In preparation for her latest series of photographs, Emma Thomson asked a diverse array of potential male sitters to pose through matchmaking applications Happn and Tinder. The photographs most certainly encapsulate Thomson’s approach to portraiture, but the degree to which the sitter is also participating in their own representation is hard to determine. As on social media, there is a version of the self that the sitter puts forth, and the photographs are discussed before they are executed. The results are at turns intimate, moving, hilarious, vulnerable and sometimes bizarre.
Thomson reveals that, in the early stages of contact with her sitters, she is frequently asked if she is ‘real’ or not, probably in response to her own sexy profile picture, thinking she may be an advertisement for Viagra or a fake account. This is fascinating in and of itself, and again changes the online dynamic we have grown so used to. Behind the camera, Thomson reverses the gender norms and shakes them up with her deadpan compositions. The negotiation between Thomson and her sitters is captured in each portrait.
In this context, each model has, at the very least, a passing familiarity with the representation of the self, through their engagement with social media. The picture on a Tinder profile is an incredibly important aspect of the application’s function, and many of these are selfies. The phone camera has become a part of the everyday exchange between millions of humanoids, and most people are now familiar with a kind of ‘curated’ collection of images of oneself (think about all of the photos your Facebook friends have posted of you that you did not like, and subsequently untagged).
Applications such