During lockdown we were forced to reassess a good deal. The one abiding thing I was left with when every extraneous- once monumental -bit of minutiae fell away, was my own sense of motherhood.

This was perhaps the sole remaining part of me that felt irreducible.

As I watched them interact one day I was reminded that the most seminal parts of our psyche are formed through play. Using theorists such as Susan Stryker, Claude Levi Strauss and Eric Berne to inform my work, I created an arena in which my children could create and play with the idea of identity, selfhood and rebirth. We created masks together using found objects and the children enacted new characters, rehearsing roles they did not yet understand.

The images from this series present a microcosm for our own societal reset, a new beginning borne of conflagration. It is worth noting that for new life to begin the old one must be raised to the ground.