Mamiyaroid 15

Conceptual Portraiture

I recently got the go-ahead to write an essay on Anya Phillips. A few years ago I became obsessed with her after seeing a photograph of her by photographer, Julia Gorton. What grew out of that obsession was this idea of photographing my friend Jaime as an actress playing Anya Phillips. I made costumes and we did a few sessions over the course of a year. Probably more than the concept, the most valuable thing to come out of all those sessions was learning to take a concept and execute it with the collaboration of a model. When I photograph my friends for author portraits they almost always are uncomfortable in front of the camera. I have to flatter them, and find a way to help them become on camera their concept of their best self. Difficult! But when it comes to author photos I don’t consider myself such a stylist that I want to impose my idea of what the person should look like. I ask them to tell me how they want to look and we will go through poses until something clicks. In that sense those photographs are not for me at all. But my work with Jaime was much more selfish. Everything Jaime did was for me. If I wanted to see how something would translate on film (or digital) she helped realize that for me. These sessions also helped me understand the process so that I could write about it in my novel.

The following photographs are not from our Anya sessions. These came later, when we both knew Jaime was moving to China. I can’t say where I got the idea for these except that I had cults and religion in mind. Guan Yin is the Buddhist Goddess of Mercy, a deity that until this year was always a quiet but insistent presence in my home, represented by a small gold statuette on my mother’s Buddha altar. But I’m not a true believer, and I had at some point conflated the image of a white statue of Guan Yin in a small reflecting pool in Taiwan with the famous image of the Birth of Venus, naked, on a clam shell. The thing I really wanted to see was what would happen if after the first few photographs I poured water on my model and photographed her wet. It was spring when this happened so not cold but definitely not warm. I don’t always turn the heat on in my apartment.

First the photographs, and then what Jaime has to say about the experience, a year and a half later.

Fuji xpro2

Mamiya RZ 67, 120 film, lomo 400

canon elan 7, 35mm, Kodak Portra 160

SX-70 camera, Polaroid 600 film using an ND filter

Jaime on the session:

“I remember feeling cold at one point, even though the water was room temperature, I think, or maybe it was mixed with hot water. The dress was a thick-ish gauzy material. We padded the wooden floor with a sheet, so my feet were not freezing. Other than this, I don't remember much about the actual feeling of the experience. What's so nice about being shot (and trusting Adalena with what she wanted to do with this) was that I didn't have to feel anything, I just followed Adalena's directions and tried my best not to make a fuss even when I had to stay still for longer than was comfortable or what not. Adalena didn't give a lot of facial expression cues and I didn't really know how to emote, so in my mind my face was blank. Because of my new hair cut, I especially felt like a little boy playing dress-up. The combination of water pouring over white gauze and flowers reminded me of my friend's traditional Burmese wedding in Myanmar I just came back from two months before. During the ceremony, the officiant poured water over the bride and groom's overlapping hands for a few minutes to signify their bind. So I was thinking about that.” 

Jaime Chu is now a writer and translator in China. Here is her piece on a Chinese DJ and the first EDM festival after the pandemic. Yes, they’ve managed to control the virus enough for this to happen.

Until next time…

Adalena

I love to receive comments and questions about photography and cameras!

My email: adalenakavanagh@gmail.com

Instagram: @mamiyaroid (instant/film) @5redpandas (personal)

Twitter: @adalenakavanagh

Also, if you’re thinking of buying Polaroid film for the first time, here is my referral code, which gets you 10% off, and I get some reward points.

Original photography prints: adalenakavanagh.bigcartel.com (I change out the shop every month of so. If you see something you like, let me know, I’m happy to make you a print.)

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-Adalena Kavanagh