And so hard to tell one from the other. That's the point. We all are one. Nothing separates us but the clothes on each other's back. Our blood flow is all the same. 99 FACES deals with the human condition by stripping the innuendo and cutting right to the chase. Put some fancy duds on somebody and guess if that model is being mentally victimized in some way. You have as many chances of being 99 times right as you would be 99 times wrong! It's a lesson in psychological photography and the art of reason.
You might as well be looking at a number with an unforeseen amount of zeros on one end and an equally long duration on the other. With people who have any strain of a mental health issue, ask yourself this question: How many people are there in the world? Just by a mere glance it is virtually impossible to fathom what the percentage of our kind makes up those census type figures. Or who or is what? Your guess is as good as mine. Just at a glance, what is the chance????
This project tries to come to that invisibly visible conclusion. Can you see in only 99 of a possible impossible scale the amount of folks who are stricken with the ailment? Yes and no. Facial ticks and sporadic movements in a specific count of pictured likenesses does not necessarily mean that those few have nature's diagnosis. Whose to judge and where are we going with all this?
99 FACES points out using a very accurate yardstick that a sizable tally of the human race are unique in their own way, some of it is obvious, many traits are not, and we fall asleep at the wheel when we try to say that somebody has a mental illness when in reality they do not. Many times, the eyes lie. Thoughts play tricks on you. You cannot come up with snap judgments of somebody just by looking at a photograph or be next to a guy and expect to give an accurate synopsis without actually to coming up with the proper detailing just by looking at a person. That is a dead giveaway that by using all backgrounds, looks and demeanor's not to mention fashion sense all the above meant to cover up the model's more obvious serious characteristics that might have given him other away, that it is humanly impossible to tell if he or she is mentally ill and it is done using a skillful artistic bent, photography and fashion.
99 FACES does not claim to be a guessing game. It simply wants to point out in a visible way using the arts that no one advocate, peer or observer looks like the stereotype or actually is what some people say about what the typical livelihood of one of us or should even be judged as such, to avoid stigma, another parallel of the 99 FACES cuisine. It tries to prove that no matter who you are, no matter what you have or have not, are or are not, it is not right to call these subjects anything than what they are: beautiful and perfect in their imperfections where nobody can guess exactly how many more sculptured souls there are before, during and after them, regardless of the planet's population..
This is not a numbers game. It comes down to setting values. People should not be labeled as having a liability because they are more or less able to do more things than they are not nor should we have to put a number on them just to prove that when you dress them up and put them next to a completely different person and make that enjoining curve go for a long distance that we are any different, prettier, look better or on the other hand deserve scorn than anyone else because we are ALL judges and juries who when we keep our mouths shut, and just be human, there is no difference from 99 FACES to 1,000,000!
Whether mentally positioned people are placed in a photo shoot or just walking down the street, the only call that should be made when comparing any homo sapien should not include the size and capacity of one another's brain or willpower but what that person can accomplish by virtue of a good heart regardless of the cards that they were dealt.
99 FACES is 100% correct in its exploration of humanity. When a certain flaw or condition presents itself, it becomes more socially acceptable under the proper circumstances, thus cutting down stigma, an enviable and proper goal in dealing with the fight against beating the weight of the disease. Dress somebody up and the neighborhood looks brighter because you become accepted as your problems are rejected. A good looking person never has to explain their pain. A lot of times the chosen few who have debilitating injuries like ours don't have that luxury and that's the point. Feel like a million bucks and full of better luck to you and yours if you buy it a nice new set of clothes. More often than not, we'll cease to disagree.
99 FACES doesn't miss a beat in explaining that both inside and out, we are all the same! But you'll never be able to tell, 99 per cent of the time!