Did you ever play that game as a kid? Or maybe it was less of a game and more a survival tactic. A way to make ourselves believe that we could disappear. that our consequences just wouldn’t happen if we couldn’t see them coming. That we could remain safe in our little blanket pod, hidden from the outside world.
There are always times we want to escape. Times we want to hide, cover up, go invisible on everyone. There were times growing up where I would fight with my siblings, scribble on the side of the couch with permanent marker, lie to my parents, then run up to my room, sit point blank in the middle of my bed and throw a blanket over my head. Believing the myth whole-heartedly. That if I can’t see you, you definitely cannot see me and will walk by without even noticing I am there, will disregard the error in my ways and forget completely why you came up to my room, stop looking for me and declare me innocent on all counts.
At 6, I was the mastermind of deception. At 43, I’ve continued to carry on the legacy. I have dragged bits of childishness into my adult life. Believing that I can escape the error of my own ways by covering myself up. Believing that I can be invisible at any point in time, because I so choose. It’s a safety net I’ve carried with me.
That self imposed safety is an illusion. And I’m slowly debunking the myth.
It is a chapter of the bigger story. A plot that is beginning to be excavated. Digging into these parts of myself through the only medium I really know how to do it in. This self portrait work is my long form documentary. My visual memoir. Looking at 40+ years of life and figuring out how to embrace it, reframe it, and carry it along with me into the next 40+ years of life.
Cinestill bwXX 120 + Mamiya RZ67 Pro II.
As for the tech talk, I took a risk with this film stock. I’ve read a little about it and believed myself to be incompetent in shooting with it, based on it’s presumed need to be spot on with exposure (which I’m not). I’ve held onto it for two years. Well, my b+w film hoard had dwindled to 1 remaining single roll and I felt I wanted to shoot. I felt that, maybe, just maybe, with a new-to-me camera I know nothing about and a film stock that was pretty much out of my league, it must be the perfect storm. I will say, I am impressed with the versatility of this film. Cinestill bwXX is a variable ISO film stock. These were shot in very low light, film rated at 1600, shot at a 15th of a second and push processed +4. This film handled all of that like a champ. And I will most definitely give it another go.