Where (and how) did you find these locations?
Chad States:The first location where I began shooting is a block away from my house. I began to be interested photographing the culture of cruising when this particular park became a cruising site over the course of a summer. I began to be curious about how cruising sites originate, since cruising is usually all about anonymity and disconnect. I did a search on the internet and discovered Squirt.org, a user-based website on places to cruise. I was excited to discover that the town I live in has numerous cruising locations. So I would do a quick search of any city I would happen to be traveling in to see where the closest cruising park was. Squirt.org facilitated me finding these sites instantaneously. Of course, cruising parks have existed long before the internet. For men who needed to find an outlet for their sexuality, necessity became the mother of invention.
TMN:Describe a typical photo shoot.
CS:I definitely can’t describe any photo shoot as typical, but to get the shots that I have I usually have to involve myself with the people at the park so that I and my camera are accepted. Usually this acceptance is very fleeting, too. I am usually only able to snap off a frame or two before the participants are no longer willing to perform—and then there are those occasions when the participants don’t even know that I am there. But there are the occasional participants who enjoy that act of being watched, and the camera is a welcome addition to their play. I try to hunt out these exhibitionists within a scene as they are the most accepting of my presence. A lot of the time I am unsure of what I am actually getting on film. I remember coming back to the hotel after a day of shooting and my partner asked me how things went. All I knew was that I had shot four rolls of film, which was a good amount for me. But the actual experience is so intense as I try to gauge when I can take a photograph or not that I have a hard time remembering the images I make as it happens.
TMN:Was there a range in the subcultures of gay men that you encountered? What was it like to meet the men in person?
CS:The wonderful thing about cruising parks is that there is generally a great cross-section of subcultures. Sex is the great unifier. All these different types of men who normally wouldn’t interact much in another situation come to the park with the same desire to physically connect. I do occasionally talk with some of the guys in the woods, but the conversations are kept brief as talking isn’t usually condoned. You don’t come to a cruising park to have full-blown conversations, though that does occasionally happen. Most interactions are kept to just making eye contact. Words are spoken only when needed.
TMN:What were you most surprised to learn about the culture of cruising as you worked on this project?
CS:Not much. I used to cruise in parks all the time as a teenager and into my early twenties and was very familiar with the culture. Which is another reason why I wanted to make these images: I always had such great experiences when I was younger and I wanted to try to document this culture. I love all the discreet signals and codes that are developed and how a lot of this activity can happen in broad daylight in public spaces; only those who are looking for it see what is happening in front of them.
TMN:Do you see your photographs as voyeuristic? Are these portraits or landscape photos?
CS:The photographs are very voyeuristic. When I photograph I want to let the viewer in, but keep them at a distance so that a voyeuristic tension always remains. I suppose the photographs are a mixture of both portraits and landscapes. I was inspired by some the French Rococo painters like Fragonard who painted these lush landscapes with hints of sex happening. I do think that the landscape is very important to the work and have shot only in parks for a reason: because they are so beautiful, but also because when one is in the woods societal rules don’t apply. It is a place to be liberated.
TMN:Who do you see as the audience for these photographs?
CS:Anyone who enjoys sex and doesn’t condemn others who do the same.
TMN:What are you working on now?
CS:A series of portraits. It is a bit hard to succinctly describe. But the portraits are coming out of thoughts I had while making the cruising images. While I was photographing for Cruising I would use myself and my body to entice and instigate situations so that I could make the photographs. I am doing basically the same thing in this series of portraits, except the interaction is much more direct and my hand as the creator of the image is at the forefront.
