Michael
he/him
Mike is a 42 year old self-described submissive faggot. He’s spent much of his life keeping the different parts of himself separate, a splintering that left life feeling a little incomplete. That’s not resolved, but he’s been letting those parts merge more, learning to be proud and confident as a friend, as a professional and as a submissive fag, each part given its own time, effort and love.
As he got older and bigger, more people read him as a dominant daddy type, and he found himself having more of that kind of sex despite being naturally submissive, chasing feeling wanted rather than what actually satisfied him. His tattoo “Dirty Faggot” above his pelvis, came from a decision to stop being shaped by what others wanted from him and to give himself permission to be truthful to his own pleasure instead.
It marks a transition and a reclamation, of himself and of his sex. Mike calls it the best thing he’s ever done. He remembers his sister seeing it and telling him it was one of the most authentic things she could imagine him doing, and the pride on her face in that moment has stayed with him since.
Body Language.
“For over thirty years, my work has centred on visibility, authorship and who gets to be seen.
This project continues my long-term commitment to photographing LGBTQIA+ lives.
For a lot of LGBTQ+ people, modifying the body is a way of marking a transition, standing in for something lost, or taking back a body that wasn’t always theirs to shape in the first place. That personal story is one I want to tell.”
Chris Jepson, photographer