"Nothing’s gone wrong actually, I just like difference," says one of the men in Natasha Caruana's photo project on cheating spouses. The 29-year-old artist documented her interactions with UK husbands in a series simply titled, “The Married Man."
Caruana found these men on websites designed for affairs, then quickly got to work. During the date, she secretly snapped photos with a disposable camera and taped their conversations on a digital recorder stashed in her purse in order to discover the husbands' "motivations and intentions," she states on her website. In each image man’s identity is concealed -- often his hands are the only body part photographed. In this way, the photographs leave much to the imagination, asking viewers to construct their own stories about the scene unfolding before them. Caruana writes about the series: "This use of the snapshot connotes a sense of something being recorded that shouldn't be seen, hurried moments of an unfinished meal, an empty seat or an obvious gesture of anticipation."
Alistair Robinson, curator of the Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art has drawn comparisons between Caruana’s work and Cindy Sherman:
‘Married Man’ might be thought of as almost a thematic negative of Cindy Sherman’s work: the desiring male subjects’ expectations and fantasies of womanhood are exposed, rather than the range of roles which women are asked to adopt.
Caruana's previous projects include “The Other Woman,” in which she documented women who have had affairs with married men, and “Fairytale for Sale,” where she befriended brides who had posted pictures of their wedding dresses online.
What do you think of “The Married Man” project? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section and be sure to check out more images in the slideshow below.
"The Married Man, 2008-2009" - Natasha Caruana
If you're still curious, see more photographs from the series on Natasha Caruana's website.