Photographing an Emotion {Conviction}

Photographs can not show emotion. 

Emotions are invisible, they are a feeling. A photograph can only show the manifestation of what we imply is an emotion. Dress can show a manifestation of the unconscious but can not actually show the unconscious because it is also invisible. So to try and create a photo that displays an emotion that incorporates the manifestation of the unconscious through dress is that a paradox? Is there a possible truth in all of this disillusion and surreal-ness? 



As an artist I would say yes but it's really the viewer who determines the meaning or lack of meaning in things like a photo. There is no conclusive statement to this musing, just an open ended thought that I find myself pondering from time to time. I often describe my layered work as trying to photograph an emotion yet I wonder what that even means. You can't cook an emotion, you can't paint an emotion, you can't sculpt an emotion but you can do all of these things attempting to invoke in the viewer an emotion. 



I wanted to put myself to a test to see if I could capture a photo that expresses conviction, a word that I hold very close to my heart. Every time I'm on a photo shoot as a model or taking photos that really excite me or just going out and doing something that I feel is getting me closer to my dreams I find myself constantly repeating this word over and over again in my head. I don't know why, no one has ever used that word to describe me and I've never really found myself saying it in day-to-day conversation yet it has somehow found me and I feel like there must be something important about that. For me I always relate the word to the idea that through anguish, pain, struggle and a lot of fucking hard work you still stay strong and true to your beliefs and keep fighting every damn day. 


I have been feeling a lot of conviction these days as I am getting closer and closer to finally moving to New York and after I was recently approached by a fan that seemed to dearly love this blog and on top of all of that I was also selected last week for a juried gallery show at the Frost Art Museum by David Castillo, a very prominent curator in Miami and New York. To say the least conviction is something that I am feeling very strongly these days and, well, like I said I wanted to try and express that in these photos. Maybe photograph's can't show an emotion but they can certainly make you feel.