Frank’s images are a fitting match for this most intriguing of ‘gallery’ spaces. The portraits of unique and engaging locals inviting us to linger a bit longer in this otherwise liminal space. The work is theatrical, with a dark whimsey that hints at interesting stories about interesting people.

In the Artist words;

Outsiders wear their badge with pride.

Not an outsider as trying to look in, but looking forward and backwards in order to escape the triviality of an unsympathetic everyday life.

Truth and freedom is their mantra.

Hoping to avoid ruination, they must create their own set of rules.

How does one visually call out to people to make them loiter and look when their rituals are anchored to the frenetic reality of day to day living and survival? Laneways are usually a thoroughfare, a route between two places. No Name Lane encourages unconstrained affective states so pedestrians in Queanbeyan might be open to stopping, engaging and making what they will of this series of images.

The people in the photographs were mostly known to me. They modelled and I used props and lighting to create a mise-en-scène. Obliquely as it might come across these images reveal aspects of outsider’s identities. Trust is difficult to build when everyone is a photographer wanting a picture. Many people initially agreed to be photographed and then evaporated from the project, but the final outsiders were willing to be less comfortable for a time, so as not to sink into an unheroic sloth.