Tag Archives: michelle sank

Michelle Sank 2013 Photographer in Residence

http://www.michellesank.com

Michelle Sank is a South African photographer who moved to England in 1987. Sank is a social documentary photographer, with her work illuminating issues around social and cultural diversity. Sank was in Jersey for six months working on a project called ‘Insula’.

These set of images follow the Archives of the past with photographers such as Henry Mullins who recorded his photographs in rows of four in large photo albums. This set of images shows the people of today living in Jersey and how different cultures and social classes live rather than just the higher social classes which were recorded in the past. I like these images as they can show the different personalities of the people of Jersey as well as letting the spectator in on the environment surrounding the subject.

One image which I find really interesting is the one below of Liberation Square on Liberation Day 2013. It interests me because of the Union Jack in the background because I would have actually expected to see the Jersey flag and not the British. One reason being that the Prime Mister at the time of World War II, Churchill, chose not to defend Jersey against Nazi invasion and also failed to announce that the Channel Islands were unarmed resulting in 47 innocent Jersey farmers to be shot and killed when the Germans arrived. Although, I realise that the reason the Channel Islands were liberated the day after Britain was because of the great effort the British and the Americans put into defending the rest of the world against the German Nazis.
I like this image because it shows how the people of Jersey will come together on this one day, 9th May, to celebrate the freedom and liberation of its past people and its ancestors.

Dais, Liberation Square, St Helier, Liberation Day 2013
Dais, Liberation Square, St Helier, Liberation Day 2013