The Feminine

The Feminine is a photographic series defining the feminine, both literally and figuratively. By defining it loosely and poetically, I seek out all its nobility as well as entrapments, keeping the feminine grounded in contradictions rather than fetishizing it to mythical often dangerous delusions. No photograph or title claims to be factual; some are, some are not. It is therefore a project of reality and dream, fact and fiction––a mash from which I distill the emotions, the toil, the beauty of the feminine.

On four separate occasions I have travelled to India with the intention of photographing women, but the effort was mostly thwarted due to the inaccessibility of the interior of homes. Through Photos for Humanity, a travel photo workshop dedicated to women helping women, I gained access into local homes. The concept allotted 20-30 girls from Chandelao, Rajasthan, India and surrounding villages their first year of college paid through our fees for the experience. In return we were matched with several of the recipients and invited into their homes to photograph.

The interior home is where the women live and work for the most part. I spent nine days photographing the girls and women of Chandelao. Resisting the often heightened romance of India in photographs, I capture the reality of the everyday, and illuminate the feminine experience within that place of mundane, earthly living. The photographs represent various roles that women in this community assume: some falling back, some moving ahead, some claiming the opportunities that are newly available to them. By often placing the subjects at the edge of the frames, I portray the marginalization of women in society here and across the globe, in spite of everything that is changing for us.

*I envision this project growing to other countries to see how the feminine is employed in each country, but also how I with my western eyes interpret the feminine within different cultural contexts.