Shannon Lynch

Social Settings (1), 2021, artist print on plate, 10 inch dia

2021 Senior Exhibition Artists

Shannon Lynch

Art + Design: Photography

About Shannon Lynch

Shannon Lynch is a photographer based in Mattapoisett, MA. She holds a BFA and BS in Photography and Bioengineering respectively from the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. Her combined interests in science and the arts began at a young age when her grandmother was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s Disease. Watching her grandmother’s decline, Shannon became well aware of the malleability of memory and began to use photography as a medium for capturing and reconstructing memories.

Statement

Growing up, my brother and my dad detested fruit. My sisters, my mom, and I preferred fruit over vegetables. As a result, I subconsciously associated vegetables as masculine, and fruit as feminine. This thought went unchecked until my mid teenage years when I found it strange that my boyfriend at the time liked Watermelon. Just before questioning his masculinity, I stopped myself and recognized how ludicrous such a thought was. As ridiculous as this example is, it made me keenly aware of a particular baseless gender norm I had constructed in my own mind that effected the way I saw someone I cared very much about, even if only in an instant.

In Social Settings, I wanted to further explore the idea of gender norms by collecting stories from participants. I asked people to send me examples of times where they were treated differently as a result of their gender. The stories, as a series, speak to the varied experiences of men and women in todays’ society. Each story, while specific to the teller, carries an element of relatability. The Photographs are constructed using silhouettes in shadow, that only subtly suggest characters features, and provide the scenes with a sense of anonymity. I’ve constructed scenes of events that would normally not be photographed and compiled them with personal stories that forces the viewer to confront the strange, sometimes humorous and often uncomfortable realities of gender bias.