Kia Ora
I have put together a book of the series I worked on last year while staying in my grandparents’ house. I named it Kia Ora, after the street in which the house resides.
Home Remains
An illegible message carved into the sand: perhaps the name of a stranger; the symbols for peace; for love. The sand’s texture is thick, grainy, inconsistent. Not the kind associated with pure, white, clear-watered beaches. Its colour is a dark brown.
Self Portrait
Often when I’m lying down hoping to get to sleep, it occurs to me I’m not breathing in much air. My nose doesn’t seem to be allowing in enough oxygen.
I try to take in deeper breaths but I need to exhale before I’ve finished inhaling. I begin to panic. I have to sit up and [...]
Cigarettes and Wildflowers
Somewhere on the side of the road between the hot tar and the cracked desert.
Like the earth’s skin. With its pores, its hairs, its imperfections, but without perspiration.
Remembering Youth Without the Smiles
I was having a discussion with a friend about childhood and the time in our lives which shapes us the most. We talked about our grandparents’ failing memories; How they seem to lose most of them but those from a certain point in childhood remain vivid.
This Far
Every time I read about somebody with depression, they say how if it was not for their partner/their kids/their friends/their pet, they would not have made it this far.
Hanged, Wrapped & Starved
The carpeted floors are uneven. They creak and threaten to break with every step. Yet it’s this upper level I love. Often devoid of people, or at least everybody seems to remain quiet. Industrial size fans line the walls. They silence any murmuring.
Half Underwater
Something different.
Something unusual.
Something new.
Something a little less ordinary.
Same Old Rage
I like to tell myself that I don’t really hope for chaos. It seems an immoral thought to wish for mayhem. But with it comes excitement. A shot of adrenalin to temporarily cure any depression. It’s this I crave.
When Time Doesn’t Matter
This has been the best day of the year because it was the least like any other. Now it’s winding down and I’m depressed. I want to cling to the taste of dirt in my mouth so I don’t forget.
As the dust begins to dissipate, the colour hides away and signs of same are revealed [...]
Urge To Live
I always get an urge to stop the car when I see roadkill. Sometimes to move the animal to save it from endless tyres. But often I don’t really know why.
Society today seems to shield us from being face to face with death, yet we’re exposed to so much more from a distance.
When I walk [...]
Somewhere Else
The pastel blues, purples and pinks are so fleeting. I want to live somewhere with a prolonged twilight. Somewhere the sky reflects infinite colours of subtle variation. And the fairytale is prolonged.
Eighteen Months
In order for life to continue, life must be consumed. At the top of the food chain, our closet of skeletons is the biggest of all. The progression of mankind is the result of a history of violence. Our intelligence is thanks to murder.
It’s hard for many to accept that a mosquito has no higher [...]
Promise Me You Won’t Remember and I’ll Tell You Everything
My only motivation to write is to interrupt the pure, blankness of the page. It’s a struggle to bring myself to the task. A task… That must be why I fight it.
During those several weeks I never saw it as a task. To pick up a pen and paper was a relief. It was a [...]
The House That Neville Built - Part 2
I don’t have many vivid memories of my grandfather. I sometimes wonder if I had photographed him, would it feel different to look at the pictures? Would I feel more connected?
Even seeing myself in images as a child, I don’t feel a sense of familiarity. So it seems like a struggle to feel familiar with [...]
Personification
Personification has always been somewhat of a fascination for me. The human brain operates by relating information to a database. It makes sense that in trying to understand the world around us we draw comparisons with what we know about ourselves.
This process involves projecting human characteristics onto animals and inanimate objects. It is also possible [...]
Embrace the Random
There is no such thing as perfection. No matter how much one strives for it, the goal can never be reached.
Many take their fulfilment from the pursuit. Many are happy with near enough. Many are never fulfilled. Never being content with the first, I have always found myself alternating between the two latter options.
Over [...]
White Wreath Day
I had the date marked in my calendar well in advance. I had to ensure I actually remembered to check a calendar so that I could be reminded. I felt like a part of me would chicken out. I felt like for some reason I wouldn’t belong.
I didn’t know why I felt it was so [...]
The World Seems So Quiet In Black and White
The waters rose a little higher than usual. Most of them went home eventually. Some stayed to wait for a new experience. But most of the everyday attendees kept away. The new visitors brought with them new objects, new feelings. The essence was still there. Better…worse. It’s just different. And that’s just fine.
Please Don’t Pray For My Soul
I find cemeteries peaceful. I’m often happier surrounded by headstones rather than the living.
I find the concept of morbidity puzzling. Acknowledging thoughts about our mortality seems to shatter a social taboo.
Love, reason and consciousness of the inevitable are what separate us from most other beings. The exploration of these is what continues to drive our [...]
Chasing Storms
Having recently completed a degree in Photography at the Queensland College of Art, I am embarking on a career in photographic art practice. With this newfound freedom from the educational structure I have begun working on several bodies of work.
My work method adapts with my emotions and my concerns in life, and with death. Only [...]
I Think I Know Her
I think I know her. In a city of two million, I wonder if that’s coincidental, or if those of a similar mould tend to seek out the same places for the same reasons.
I’m sure it saddens many how the more people there are the less they seem to communicate. It’s a nice feeling driving [...]
What’s So Scary About Death?
I hate that I spent so much of my life afraid of death.
I hate that I was brought up shielded from the realness.
Telling children there is a place called hell is torture.
Telling children there is a place called heaven may not be torture but it’s still a lie.
Let people open their eyes. They may see [...]
The House That Neville Built
At 98 years old my grandmother could no longer look after herself and finally had to leave her house. Her husband, Neville, died about 10 years ago. He was a carpenter and built the house himself.
It was also home to my mother and her four sibilings. I remember going to many family get-togethers with the [...]
Of A Tragedy
so long
clinging climbing crashing
feet to torso dangling
splashing sputtering suffocating
That’s The Thing About Living
A dragonfly caught in a spider’s web. It stops struggling to watch the sun go down. Roots of mangroves intertwine. Hands joined or endless struggle.
A forest peephole mirrors the world outside. Forgotten by tomorrow. A ripple in a creek otherwise calm. A sigh for something, somewhere.
That’s the thing about living.
Inner Confrontation
A single moment of a person’s existence captured forever so that we can attempt to see further into their soul. A resolution matters little. It’s what we learn about human nature and ourselves along the way, which makes sharing this moment worthwhile.
My dear friend and serial model Ashleigh shaved her head last year. She asked [...]
There’s No Poetry In Being Alone
Loneliness may inspire poetry. Isolation may be a good time to write poetry. But there’s nothing poetic about the feeling of being alone.
My image was used on the cover of a book entitled I Made You to Find Me by Jane Hedley.
When the designer asked to use my image for a book on poetry, I [...]
The World In A Box
Before the days of the handheld consumer camera there was a bit of a fad in buying these little viewing boxes with a lens and mirror where you could basically walk around holding it out to see the image on a little 2D plane. It sounds counter-intuative to us but we couldn’t understand, as today [...]
The Intricacies of Introverts and Extraverts
Can they live in harmony? If you answered “yes”, you’re probably an extravert. If you’re an introvert you probably didn’t answer at all so as to avoid an argument with the extraverts. Everyone has a general idea of the difference between the two, but does either one understand it better than the other?
Generally speaking those who [...]
I Need Someone To Walk Me Home
I sit in front of my camera in 1000 pieces. I use tweezers to ever so carefully place the tenth and final aperture blade in place on top of the previous blade and underneath the first blades. They sit above another plate, which covers five more delicate shutter blades. It’s difficult to line up the [...]
Patients
“Patients” began from looking into photographic history and in particular post-mortem photographs. It’s a journey through the modern art timeline and an analysis of the portraiture canon.
The portrait is traditionally an interaction between the viewer and the eyes of the actor. The direction of the actor’s gaze allows the actor to determine where the viewer [...]
