John Art

John Trobaugh
Double Duty Photography Statement

Examining the past to embrace the present, I have developed a body of
work focusing on self-exploration. The photographs in my Double Duty
series started as key events and characters from my fantasy life as a
child. The photographs represent the expression of emotional
attachments that are still publicly unacceptable.

The photographs in my Double Duty series started as key events and
characters from my fantasy life as a child. The photographs represent
the expression of emotional attachments that are still publicly
unacceptable. The scale places the viewer eye to eye with these
twelve-inch dolls in a believable human environment.

Describing this work, which was featured on the cover
of Art Papers, Richard Meyer, Chair of the Department of Art and Art
History at The University of Southern California, said this work
“challenges a common concept of masculinity, not because of any graphic
depiction of sexuality,” but because the images are seen as ambiguously
homoerotic.

Building upon previously explored themes, this most recent set of
images takes "Americana" and claims it as its own. I have taken the
dolls to prominent national and regional (specifically southern) sites
to photograph their imagined interactions with the people and the
setting.