Michael Max Mc Leod / Casual encounters

Causal Encounters Volumes 1-5

 The fifth installment of McLeod's on-going self-published zine series, they are strange little books, each containing photographs taken during the photographer's meetings with men he finds on online dating sites. As McLeod describes it, his work centers around the relationship between sexuality and technology. His use of the internet and photography is not far from Chad States'Trade, but the result is something else all together. Titled after their subject, each book tells a story in five images, stories that are at times uncomfortable in their voyeuristic intimacy, but notably brief. Some of McLeod's images take us into his subject's homes where we catch glimpses of their surroundings, and all pose of his camera, sometimes nude, but none of the images are sexually graphic. Each book is an arresting combination of emotional rawness and distance. 

from Casual Encounters 001 and Casual Encounters 002, respectively

Book 001 is titled Cameron, and opens with an image of the photographers shadow stretching across the front door of his subject's house. Inside, we get a few shots of the house's cinderblock interior, and a few portraits of Cameron himself, nude, but looking more thoughtful than seductive. Josh, volume 002, is an older man, and his poses are both more sexual and aggressive, though his face is never visible -- he stands naked facing the camera, hands covering his face. Volume 003, SPNDXBOI, is the strangest of the group, comprised of a series of nearly identical photographs of a man in variously colored zentia suits -- spandex garments designed to conceal the entire body. He sits on the same colorless carpet, in the same pose, the same electrical cord strewn on the carpet behind him. Volume 004, Tom, stands out as somehow feeling more tender. It opens with a grid of images of cell phone base station antenna, and Tom sits for his portrait with a slight smile on his face. The latest book, Ron, is perhaps the most lonely feeling, opening with the exterior of a cheap motel and moving to photographs of a bed, one of which has a man laying on it. 

from Casual Encounters 003 and Casual Encounters 004, respectively

cover of and image from Ron