Cillian O'Sullivan
Hi! I'm a student based in Dublin. I am interested in wildlife photography and use photography to try and express how I see the world. All of my work has some close connection to my hobbies and outside interests. I photographed a bunch of fish tanks for one project because I simply love fish, while for another project, I made studio portraits of bikers who are friends of mine! Anything can be an interesting subject, nothing is off the table when it comes to photography. I'm currently exploring more styles of underwater photography so I can capture better, more natural photographs of fish.
Sold
‘Sold’ is an exploration into the spaces where live fish can be purchased. The project consists of typographical photographs of fish tanks which can be found in retail pet stores contrasted with close-up shots of the livestock. The typographical shots have an emphasis on the text, which is written onto the tanks themselves, advertising the species and price of the fish contained within each tank. The close-up shots have my personal interventions with text that is intentionally blunt and nonsensical in retaliation to the industrial and retail-oriented text found on the tanks. This project shows viewers these spaces and invites them to form their own opinions on the practice of selling livestock. What goes into negotiating a price? What makes one fish different from the other? Where do they really come from?
Irish Bikers
‘Irish Bikers’ are a series of portraits. The project aimed to show the bikers for who they are and display their character through photographs in an attempt at breaking the biker stereotype. Each subject was photographed with a stereotypical, black and white ‘hard man’ portrait, that had a corresponding, soft and coloured portrait with a more genuine attitude. I started with the black and white portraits, which I directed them to try to look rough and tough, which they found quite funny and were happy to try act out the stereotype. This loosened up the mood in the studio and banter and jokes were at an all-time high. When I moved onto the more genuine portraits, all I did was ask them to sit down and feel free to do what they wanted which resulted in genuine, more candid portraits of these men.