In Rooms
For all the words I could never write,
the camera became my pen -
In Rooms began as a visual diary in the winter of 2011 when I first picked up a 35mm camera. The camera served as a tool to express myself, as a method to escape my moods and release them. In August 2014, after acquiring a Hasselblad, I committed my life to the creation of art. In Rooms evolved into an ongoing visual narrative and abstract diary, primarily self portraits. In the spirit of a personal diary, In Rooms is published into volumes of photo books presented in chronological order. In Rooms Volume I was released in May 2016. Volume II in the fall of 2018. Volume III is currently in production.
My subjects are myself and people that I love or admire deeply - people that I get to know over time and study their inner worlds of violence, desire, madness and fear, like my own. The story is personal, created through the intense confrontation of my inner dialogue, shadow self, mental health and minds of my subjects. While personal, it is my intention to tap into the collective unconscious in the hopes that the story is not my own, but each of ours. .
All work is printed in the darkroom, any manipulation is done in camera or in the darkroom. In some kind of hypnosis, listening to classical music, I pour my soul into each print.
Influences: Psychoanalysis, Jungian Psychology, Mental Health, Francesca Woodman, Duane Michals, Lauren Simonutti, Hans Bellmer, Joel Peter Witkin, Claude Cahun, Maya Deren, Anais Nin, The Yellow Wallpaper, David Lynch, etc..