Polly BORLAND
Untitled XXVIII 2010
Type C photograph
80 x 69 cm
Artbank collection
“Much of my work is about love”, Polly Borland has said of her acclaimed photographic practice. Looking at her 2010 series ‘ Smudge’ you can see how this is true. Borland angles her lens at a fetishistic cast of characters whose identities are smudged, smeared, streaked, smoked and smouldering. Embellished with various prosthetic devices and fancy-dress costuming, they evoke multiple meanings of love either amplified or tainted by the intersecting sensations of desire and sadness.