Sarka Encasement is a Flickr account made by a woman who has a fetish for wearing tights. She covers her entire body and face in multiple layers of nylon in varying colours and then poses in them at home. Sometimes she wears a wig, high heels and a dress over the top her new nylon skin too. When I first found Sarka Encasement I emailed her with a desperate need to interview her. Like most internet fetishists who share their ultra private images online through Flickr her idenitiy is completely anonymous. I wasn’t necessarily interested in finding anything personal out about her, but it was more about a need to understand how and why she’s made these fascinatingly original photos of herself trapped under layers and layers of women tights.

Sarka replied almost instantly and explained how her english speaking is almost non existent, but she’d be happy for me to write about her, she also suggested I like her on Facebook and watch her videos on Youtube. This is when I found out that Sarka has a huge following and religiously updates her social media outlets daily.

A fetish for tights isn’t necessarily that original, it of course falls under the category of underwear, there is something enticing about seeing a woman in nothing but them because they indicate to the notion of undressing. Tights are never worn as a singular garment but something to accessories with. There is also the aspect of tights fitting to every curve of the body, exaggerating the shape of the female form, they refer to nakedness without sharing any actual flesh. Then there is also the tactile nature of tights, the friction that they cause with skin and how thin the actual material is between whoever is touching the person wearing them. There is something fragile about tights, they aren’t garments that have a long lifespan, they can be ripped and torn easily, the anxiety of how accessible the flesh becomes under the sexually aroused human touch. Suffocation and an understanding of how her breathing will become affected is also another angle to Sarka’s popularity.

Through her layers her body becomes trapped, maybe it wants to be freed, maybe its that restriction that is also so arousing. Her facial features become squashed, her eyesight hindered, sense of touch and smell compromised, access to her mouth is denied and hearing muffled. As her senses are negotiated through her fetish it is almost like her being becomes less human, even alien. In many ways Sarka’s creation is intrinsically female, her body is exaggerated through a woman’s under garment. However this denies any personality or individually. When she does apply clothing over her new layer of skin they vary from the stereotypically slutty to the average euro trash, essentially the kind of fashions that porn stars wear.

Some photographs hint to the image of a gimp, but Sarka is clearly the one in charge in her presentation. It is unclear who takes these photographs but it would be easy to guess that it was that of her partner. With many of the interviews which I have completed with fetishists they’ve been created by and for men so it is fascinating and even empowering to see a woman take such control of her passion and clearly experience so much enjoyment from it too. The abundance of images and videos that Sarka has created aesthetically stand alone as fascinating examples of how we are all using the internet now. The domesticated settings and faux fashion poses she twists her body into accompanied with the amateur nature of the photography turn Sarka’s creations into some of the most riveting modern images of outsider sexuality. Before the advent of the internet, an understanding of these private and obscure fetishes would have been unheard of or only accessed in small quantities. Now anyone can share anything resulting in some of the most startlingly original images of our contemporary photo sharing obsessed culture.

Perhaps what is the most interesting aspect of Sarka is how eccentric her sexuality is and the work that she creates from it most probably strongly contrasts with the reality of her day to day life. Her music taste, political beliefs and understanding of culture most probably delves into the mainstream, but her understanding of becoming sexually aroused explores the depths of surrealism.

Follow Sarka on Facebook here.