ENTRY DESCRIPTION
Ali & Devin of Wild Wolf Leatherwork, a pair of American queer, sex-positive leatherworkers and analogue photographers who passed through London whilst travelling Europe in the summer of 2017, for my ongoing series The Forest.
Began in late summer 2015, The Forest is a conscious departure from masculinity and modern life, both in medium and in subject matter. The subjects are nude, but it is an unselfconscious and primordial nudity, reclaimed from the male gaze and with a softness and intimacy to the images rarely captured in a male lens. They are in nature and a part of it; they aren’t conquerors of the natural world, they are skyclad witches and exultant earth goddesses in communion with nature, vulnerable yet unafraid. The distinction between the human figures and the non-human natural elements has become blurred and the artificial divide between individuals and their landscapes erased. And yet the models remain people, as unique and individual as the environments they are a part of, not anonymous figures bereft of identity. They are willing collaborators and active participants, captured with the ritual alchemy of analogue photography.
Shot entirely on film and processed and printed by hand by the artist, the series makes use of now antiquated processes to draw attention to the tactile and physical qualities of the images and the subjects within, in an age where photography is everywhere yet mostly incorporeal and ephemeral. The texture of the film grain echoes the unairbrushed skin textures; the stray processing artifacts reflect the unaltered natural imperfections of the models and the environment.
The images of The Forest recognise that the relationship between body and land is something elemental. They are an expression of freedom and of liberation of spirit, continuing a tradition stretching back generations.
AUTHOR
I am a British LGBTQ+ visual artist working primarily with analogue photography, specialising in nude portraiture. I studied Fine Art at Central St Martins and continue to live and work in London.
In 2020 I received a Gold Award in the San Francisco Bay International Photo Award, an Honourable Mention in Photos Des Femmes’ seeingWOMEN Awards and in the 15th Julia Margaret Cameron Award. In 2019 I was awarded an Artist Residency prize and a Special Mention of the Jury Award in photography from the Mediterranean Contemporary Art Prize. Also in 2019 I was a semi-finalist in the Head On Portrait Prize, obtained 3rd place in Nudes from the Monochrome Photography Awards, received an Honourable Mention at the Tokyo International Foto Awards, and was an official selection for the Imago Lisboa Meeting Point portfolio reviews. In 2018 I was a nominee for the PhotogrVphy Grant. In 2017 I was the subject of the award-winning short documentary A Film On Film by David McNulty. In 2014 I received the Silverprint/Photofusion Black and White Photography Award.
The first nude body I photographed was my own. My self-portraiture is a way for me to explore my own vulnerabilities, and I did this by removing my clothing, my armour. Later, others responded to this vulnerability and began allowing me past their own armour.
By shooting on film my photos become tactile objects, a counterpoint to the incorporeal and ephemeral digital photography that surrounds us every day.
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