Miles Collyer’s TrackTop Masks
The balaclava ski mask is perhaps the world’s most maligned articles of clothing. The balaclava has primarily been associated with the ominous, dangerous or unpleasant; terrorism, criminals or at best, an extremely cold winter. Miles Collyer’s photographic series TrackTop Masks investigates the iconic balaclava mask’s place within the oeuvre of masks. A theme rich with meaning and contradictions, masks can be at once celebratory and foreboding, spectacle and necessity, disguise and revelation. Collyer takes large-scale photographic portraits of himself wearing a colorful variety of Balaclava masks paired with matching zip up track suit tops. Taken from the waist up upon a stark black background these are superheroes and supervillians, mug shots and glamour shots each curiously individual and strikingly uniform. TrackTop Masks examines the tension between appearance and identity, the body and fashion and ultimately challenges the very function of portraiture.
-Sarah Todd, 2006