Back to the Beginning: Portraiture

 

In the past year or so, I have been working extensively with portraiture.  I have been inspired by the works of Diane Arbus, Annie Liebovitz, Jessica Todd Harper, Patrick Nagatani, Hans Bellmer, and many other artists who have explored the meaning of self, whether through portraying themselves or others.  Many of these artists construct elaborate scenes in order to create their images, others seem to be inspired by the immediacy of a genuine moment in time.  One project I seem to return to over and over again concerns the idea of portraying the individual by photographing the back.   

Throughout my back series, I explore the ideas of the macro and micro and our place within these two separate lenses.  I photographed the back on a micro level in which the hairs, bumps, and markings become a physical landscape, and then again on the macro level in which the back becomes a small piece of visual information within a vast literal landscape.

 

As I continued to shoot, working with literally thousands of separate images collected from a variety of subjects and situations, I began to explore the ideas of the body concerning muscle memory and the body being a record of life events, both physical and emotional.  Having photographed subjects from two years of age to adults in their thirties I began to see the toll life takes on the structures we inhabit.  I mean this, not in the physical sense, in which we are injured and scarred, but in the emotional sense in that our body records stress in the musculature, particularly the back.  

 

 

These realizations caused me to consider whether people realize what they reveal about themselves when they expose the back.  Many of my subjects were more willing to pose partially nude simply because I was shooting them from behind.  Why is this?  It seems as though human beings place a great deal of importance on the front of their physique: their face and chest specifically.  However, I found (having photographed many subjects in a variety of situations) that I was able to connect emotionally with my subject, and glean more of who they were by shooting them from behind, as opposed to doing a traditional portrait.   

As a whole, I wonder if this series and my fascination with the human back, will ever end.  I feel that I could keep shooting along these lines for a long time and not tire of the images I am able to construct.

Another series I have been exploring extensively over the past year has dealt with an under-appreciated, under-represented demographic that is dear to my heart.  I began taking portraits of adults with disabilities that I have been able to build relationships with.  I feel that these portraits, and the series as a whole are not yet complete, as this is a personal project that I do not take lightly.  I look at these images and see dear friends, and the meaning behind each photograph is still developing for me.

Aftermath

 This series was incredibly interesting for me.  It began as an attempt to stray from my style of constructed images and move into the realm of photojournalism.  These images became somewhat personal since they were taken in my own neighborhood.  The woman who inhabited the house depicted was evicted from her home, since she was a hoarder.  She had been living with no electricity, heat, or plumbing was living in her own feces, as well as that of animals infesting her home. 

 Many of these images are particularly heartbreaking for me, simply because it is awful to think that the human need to acquire things can stretch this far.  Why do we feel a need to fill loneliness and despair in this way?  While walking through the home, I was overwhelmed physically and emotionally.  The stench was overpowering and the sadness seemed to weigh heavily on the home.  I literally felt weighed down.

 This series, for me, became more about the aftermath of the hoarding than the original story as I knew it.  It speaks, on a more macro sense, of the aftermath of trauma and the idea of the hidden self within the shell that the world sees.  As an onlooker, I never knew what lay inside the walls of this home and what scars would come to light after entering it.

Valley of the Dolls

 This series is one that I photographed by constructing images on a scanner bed.  This form of photography is interesting because the image is being constructed on a flat glass surface.  The lighting becomes very bizarre because it is perfectly even and records every detail, then falls into a disturbing black.  I found that this series became about constriction and anxiety.  Many other interpretations can be made about this work, and I strongly believe that each viewer has the right to the validity of their own impressions.  As this series developed, it became very much about the idea of "process," and, in a sense, became meditative.  This began as I isolated myself in a dark environment to construct the images on the scanner, and then later expanded as I printed the images.  I printed these on an Epson Matte paper, and then cut them apart, sewing them systematically to a Gray BFK Rives printmakers paper.  I then used the chine collee printmaking process to cover parts of the images with a transparent tai kojo rice paper.  This process, as a whole, became ritualistic, meditative, and seemed to speak of a deeper story than what I have to offer as an explanation for the images.  I chose to post the original images, simply because the final product does not translate as well when scanned again and posted.

The Paint Series

This series began very impulsively.  I began exploring the effect of photographing paint layered over the skin, and something very meaningless began to express a great deal about what was passing through my mind at the time.  A series that began as an exploration of color vs. black and white, composition, and visual texture became a dynamic journey for me about the body.  Perhaps being influenced by my previous back project and the ideas dealing with the body as a record of life events, I began to see these paint markings on the skin as a record as well.  The images began to speak of inner turmoil and guilt, as well as peace and love.  This series, like many of the other projects I have explored, I feel, remains unfinished.

Miscellaneous Images