Captured Complexities: ‘Smile if you’re Gay’

Hi

As I’m sure you know, February is LGBT+ History Month, an annual, month long celebration and remembrance of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender history. This year’s theme, “Behind The Lens”, celebrates the LGBTQ+ community’s contribution to film and cinema from behind the lens. Here at the University, we have extended this focus to celebrate and recognise the work of our photography students, behind the lens, alongside the work of students in the School of Creative Industries.

In this week’s blog we feature the work of Jacek Davis studying MA Photography.

Jacek Davis, whose work celebrates queer culture, is working successfully as a freelance photographer in Cardiff and London after graduating with a master’s degree in Photography from University of Gloucestershire. His clients include the award-winning musician Gwenno and international fashion designer Beatrice Von Tresckow, and his images have been featured by Kaltblut, Germany’s leading magazine for art, fashion and music, and Haüs, which focuses on social and political issues surrounding the LGBT community.

“My work celebrates queer culture and allows an expression of my own queer identity,” says Jacek, who found his inspiration within artists such as Rene Magritte, Egon Schiele and Francis Bacon, and photographers Tim Walker, David LaChapelle and Guy Bourdin.

“I have never shied away from my sexuality; whilst I have been seen as an ‘outsider’, I have never felt restricted within my work when expressing queer culture.

“The images that I produce may be seen as confrontational, intrusive, and sometimes uneasy to view. This represents the discomfort that queer people face as they struggle with self-identity and compliance to societies’ conventions.” For his master’s degree at University of Gloucestershire, Jacek produced the project ‘Smile if You’re Gay’ featuring images portraying the stereotype of gay men in the UK media. Jacek, who lives in the Cotswolds, explains about his photographs pictured here: “The model within the images is a homosexual and is devoured by a deconstructed rainbow flag; the images were created as a message of unavoidability, acceptance and power, a journey which I have personally taken.”

We would like to thank Jacek Davies for sharing his amazing work as well as his story with us.