Gorgeous : In the neck of time

It is a series of 115 photographs made over a two year period by Pauline Thomas, a 28 year-old French conceptual photographer who spends her time between Paris and London.

 ....without faces, she sees these as portraits...the heads, turned to the rear,...necks tensed,..creating a new identity...often disguising the gender...

Pauline Thomas has a few really interesting projects.

Her interactive and photographic works have already been exhibited and earned several awards in international competitions and a special mention for “In the neck of time” project at the 5th Lucie Awards in the Portrait category.

At La Scatola, Pauline presents an extract of her disruptive photographic series “In the neck of time”. She took the portrait of 123 men and women, face turned to the rear, surfacing a new representation of identity free from genre, social and esthetic aspects.

"Originally, I had taken this autoportrait to get a visual understanding of the throat* role in the body mecanism when you need to produce a sound. It conjured up in me the intimate feel and the sensuality of a woman’s neck, violently challenged by the potent, erect jaw.

I started this serie shooting women necks. As each woman disclosing voluptuously her neck to me, they were revealing a strange phallic identity and I thought that introducing men’s necks could reveal another understanding of woman gender as well. Who’s the man? Who’s the woman?

123 people let going themself, the head drawn behind, in this ecstatic position, I felt as though I were taking stolen pictures, since none of them was able to strike a pose or use of an attitude … I could finally make straightforward portraits.

I understood that I was doing portraits that were telling another story…"