Paul Adair
"Decoy may best be described as ‘constructed photography’, where objects and taxidermy animals are staged in front of the camera. I am interested in the duration and performance of physically building temporal sculptural objects, which are then recorded on film by traditional mechanical/chemical means without digital alteration.
Through scrutinizing the crossovers between photography and sculpture the work also examines how we define our perception of reality through photography and the relationship between image and object. The title of the work proposes a connection between the role of a ‘decoy’ in nature and hunting to the field of artificiality versus the real in photography.
Nature and artifice meet in a white light void that forms a wasteland, to construct iconic images which reference childhood memories and their extended narratives. Viewing the images becomes a game which challenges perceptual judgement, complicating the idea that ‘seeing is believing’, capturing an oscillation between authenticity and deceit."
(Paul Adair on Decoy 2005)
