For example, without knowing that Katherine Bosse had photographed a room that could be hired for sex, the viewer could be forgiven (or even applauded) for assuming 'Classroom' was indeed that, or a playroom in a well to do home.
The ethnicity of the man looking through the blinds in 'United States of America' doesn't talk to me of espionage or of any covert operation. Having a phone in the image doesn't necessarily imply that he's waiting for it ring, anymore than he's waiting for the lamp to turn off. These are such common things in an hotel room that they cease to carry specific meaning.
How one relates to this type of image is surely dependent on the viewers experience. Without the explanation of the intent, this image says to me, "I'm a visitor to the city. My colleague is late collecting me for our meeting".
Perhaps the viewing of a single image is the issue here. Viewing a collection might make the intent clear, but I'm unsure. I will need to check this at further exhibitions. Next visit, I will not read anything out it and try to divine the artists intention.
If I had not read the intentions of Noel Bowler's 'Making Space' exhibitions, I might have worked out that Islam was present in the photographs, but I would have assumed they were back rooms at a Mosque rather than places of worship set in unusual buildings. The only clue would have been the single image of the outside of a suburban house.
Would I have know that this was about Islam in Ireland? No. Would I have linked the ordinariness of these places of worship as something that undermines our paranoia about terrorism? No.
Being told of the purpose doesn't undermine the power of the images, but does suggest that often the images cannot tell a story alone. What the exhibition did do, was to reinforce some of my prejudices, and expose my ignorance of Moslem worship.
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