Hope & Bruising, a reflection on the brutal and fragile nature of being a dreamer, and the places we haunt during the journey of hopes brutality.

It’s hard for me not to allow the people I work with to bleed into the bones of the project we share. Celeste is a dear friend of mine, one I hold very close to my heart. She and I are both creatives. We routinely confess to each of our silent weepings for this life that was seemingly chosen for us. On the cruel reality of being soft and open like roadkill, of seeing the world through a million tunnels, in a dizzying kaleidoscope of colour, of having hope for it all, even when your heart and body feel shattered like pink fibre glass.

My cousin and her fiancé just moved into their first home. It’s a little rough around the edges but holds a perfectly eerie charm, with a huge backyard and some unsettling garden sheds they have no idea what to do with. Upon my first visit I knew I wanted to use their home as the backdrop of our shoot, and thankfully they were gracious enough to say yes. I’m always drawn to suburban environments in my work, perhaps because that’s were I’ve spent most of my life. They possess a certain secluded sadness that always seems to compliment the subject matter I’m dealing with.

I knew we needed to showcase our characters inner battle with external injuries, so we added some fading bruises to Celeste’s face and hands, and made our best attempt at fashioning a sling through some google image reference photos. I always choose my costume pieces very carefully. I wanted her outfits to feel romantic, yet convey an unspoken fragility. All of the pieces were sourced secondhand and are considerably unique. I needed her wardrobe to reflect her inextricable artistry, her somewhat disgruntled need to be seen for what she is, for what she’s trying to become. These vibrant pieces are juxtaposed by the banality of our mundane suburban backdrop.

Along with aiding the aesthetic value of our photos, each prop was carefully chosen to be an extension of our characters complex inner world. A world of longing, of a steady and encompassing desire to run (just about anywhere), and a festering malady of unrealised potential.