Artist statement: I am interested in images that arouse our curiosity and play with our expectations. Our imaginations are what free us from the mundane and return us to the magical. ‘Self-portrait with mouche’ was created in response to a fleeting image I had seen in a documentary on immigrants arriving in Australia in the early twentieth century. One image stood out, of a young man with a very noticeable facial mole whose position echoed that of the artificial beauty spot made famous by Marilyn Monroe. The blowfly became my muse in the process of cross-fertilising these two contrasting images of the natural and the contrived, the beautiful and the grotesque, to create a new hybrid. Like a metaphor for photography itself, ‘Self-portrait with mouche’suggests both the fragility of presence and the stillness of death. Serendipitously, I discovered that the word for artificial beauty spot is the French word for fly; mouche.
Also known as Giclee prints or bubble-jet prints, pigment ink-jet prints are generated by computer printers from digital or scanned files using dye-based or pigment-based inks. A series of nozzles spray tiny droplets of ink onto the paper surface in a precise pattern that corresponds to the digital image file. In dye-based prints the ink soaks into the paper, whereas in pigment-based prints the ink rests and dries on top of the paper surface.
Whilst the term is broad, pigment ink-jet prints have come to be associated with prints produced on fine art papers. They are the most versatile and archival method of printing available to photographers today. A wide variety of material on which an image can be printed with such inks are available, including various textures and finishes such as matte photo paper, watercolour paper, cotton canvas or pre-coated canvas.
