The design of Dualism: Portraits & Poems juxtaposes a poem with a portrait of its author.

The conceptual envelope for uniting these two art forms takes its cue from the antique notion of the mind / body dichotomy. While, in any literal sense, this philosophical concept has long since been exploded, we still tend to employ it as a mental short-hand, a useful binary. The project will play upon the strange contrast between the physical outer shell of the poet and the ideations that stem from within them. This concept will govern the overall aesthetic, but is not intended to inform the poetic works. In fact the more various the subject matter and tonalities featured the better.

The aesthetic of the photography focuses on capturing the essential character of each individual in a mutual meeting of subjectivities between the sitter and the photographer.

All of the poets are Scottish or of Scottish origin, selected according the quality of their writing by our commissioning editor, Thom Laycock. We hope that by combining the fields of poetry and visual art, we can open both to new platforms and audiences.

TO VIEW FULL PROJECT INCLUDING FEATURED POETRY, DOWNLOAD THE DUALISM: PORTRAITS & POEMS PDF FROM 'PORTFOLIO PDFs' IN THE LEFT-HAND MENU.

‘The fifties were swinging! The sixties were a lot of fun…’
‘….all that has happened in the last fifteen years is technology.’

My subject, Terry, grew up on a dairy farm outside of Perth and worked as an airon boy for a hardware store. He was fifteen years old, delivering a door hinge to the Regal cinema in Auchterander when he saw an advert projected through an old glass slide on to the cinema screen reading ‘Projectionist required’. It was 1956, Terry, still in school began his career as a film projectionist.

On Monday 12th of February, he ran his first film – ‘Man of the Moment’ starring Norman Wisdom; ‘The whole town knew me, you had to get it right or you’d end up with your balls in your mouth!’ His lasting memory is being ‘Away up with the Gods…’ with the smell of the machinery, ‘…the machines don’t smell so much of oil now though, it was different then’. World War two had ended and automated record players were invented; it was ‘A big brand new future for the world’ and Terry was to watch every flicker and flashing light of it. His career bounced him year to year through dark and enchanted projection room to the next, until finally settling in Dundee cinemas in 1975 until his retirement.