'Dead Men Don't Look Like Me' (2012)
Paul Schiek, although not the photographer of the images, has made several technical choices when deciding which images of the 1950's mugshots he published in this body of work. Schiek did not choose the most pristine images that he could find that had the perfect framing, instead he chose images that had blemishes, weren't framed 'correctly,' or were even missing sections of the image. He did all of this to help further the emotional engagement with the image.
I believe that Schiek was trying to portray the emotions of the men in these images, rather than their true purpose as mugshots. When Schiek took these images and blew them up to greater-than-life size, he gave each portrait a new identity. He allowed the emotions of the men to spill out of the images with every technical and conceptual choice.
I love this body of work; Schiek took images that could very easily have been found boring, and gave them new purpose and life. It is nice to see an image that is not perfect, each blemish and crease add character and emotion that may have not been able to be portrayed without it.
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