I am fascinated by the idea of communicating something intimate and whole with an audience. Through the use of light and flowers, I aim to shape the tone and language with which I communicate not only with viewers, but also with the world around me.
This project centers on expressing my own thoughts and emotions, something I do not often openly reveal within the work I share with others. At the same time, it is not solely about my personal experiences. I want viewers to encounter moments of themselves within the work, to recognize their own thoughts, feelings, and memories within the movement of light and shadow as it passes through the petals of the flowers.
Apart from their visual appeal I chose flowers, specifically employing the Victorian Flower Language. It is a 19th-century coded communication system where flowers and plants were used to send secret messages, allowing individuals to express emotions forbidden by strict social etiquette. I paired these with fragments of my own poetry, because their meanings are endless and constantly shifting. I see them in a particular way and use them to communicate my own emotions and experiences, yet the language of flowers is never fixed. Their symbolism changes depending on the viewer, allowing others to project their own perspectives and memories onto the work just as I project mine. That shared interpretation and emotional connection is central to the project.
One of my concerns is accessibility within the work. Ideally, I want anyone who engages with art, not only those academically trained within it, to feel a connection to these images and the emotions they carry. I worry that some viewers may only see beautifully lit flowers, while others may search for hidden meaning. I have come to realize that both responses are valid. Beauty itself is a form of communication.
Themes of message, language, and emotional communication frequently appear throughout my work. I often use light and shadow not simply as compositional tools, but as subjects themselves, capable of carrying emotion and meaning. In this project, the flowers become the primary vessel for symbolism, while the light and shadow deepen and clarify their emotional weight.
I incorporated pieces of my own poetry and handwritten text alongside the images. The writing serves as a glimpse into my personal interpretation of the flowers and what they communicate to me emotionally. Rather than defining a single meaning, the text is intended to suggest and allude to my perspective while still leaving room for the audience to form their own. The contrast between my interpretation and that of the viewer is something I find deeply compelling. Writing the text in my own handwriting further emphasizes intimacy, presence, and vulnerability within the work.
While I would not say that a single artist directly influenced my decision to create this body of work, the ideas behind it are ones I have carried with me for a long time. Visually, I draw inspiration from Sally Mann’s flower Polaroids and the atmosphere of Dutch still-life paintings featuring flowers and fruit. I am interested in combining the richness and symbolism found within those works with the vibrancy and texture of color film to create images that feel both intimate and timeless.
(Baby's Breath) Chaste, in the form of light– a steadfast presence, spilling through soft fractures, you become. Spreading through, overgrowing in the need to reach, to touch the light in me. Before it disappears behind the hands of time.
(Lilies) I see the darkness where you see the light. Your touch feather light as I am kissed from behind. turned you are ignited within your purity.
(Baby's Breath and Lilies) You are the rain that knows when to fall. Pure and clear a quiet mercy, from the bruised sky. You slip through as a chill that burns deep into bones.
(Roses) The tremble of my chest, the weight of the silence holds. As the sun paints my face in fractured light.
(Roses and Hyssops) Here the decay cannot follow. Here the darkness is only the path, the door. And the love is what remains. Patient as the tide, endless as the sky turning.
(Carnations, Roses, and Hyssops) My love– beyond the ruin of bone and bloom. We will meet again, in the chill of the passing moons. As our voices meet in the dead of night.
(Carnations and Hyssops) We are equals in the grave, where every fresh thing softens into the earth. Where names dissolve like rain in stone, and time forgets the shapes of hands.
(Hyssops) From shattered stone and weathered sorrows. Vines rose like hymns– threading through regalia’s light. Within the broken wall of the santcorium.
(Lilies and Hyssops) It is not that the destruction ended the story. But rooted itself so deep, a daunting beauty beauty began to rise.
(Roses and Lilies) All that blooms rots softly, in spring’s returning wake. Suffering is the fire– the hands of ruin, the touch of purification. What dies feeds the rot, unseen.
(Carnations) To my future love, you don’t yet know. But I am preparing for you. In passion and growth, finding myself. So I can lean into you. Into your warmth, and your wildness too.
(Carnations and Baby's Breath) Clear and cutting, your silence rings in my ear like the cold. White and pure in its gentality. Soft and piercing in its kindness.
(Amaryllis) Scars littered your skin. Catching the half light in a silvery glow. Chin raised– unyielding, unbowed. So defiant you are, as you wear your wounds like armor. Forged not to hide your pain, but to reflect it, mirrored.
(Hydrangeas) You were the thing that was rotting within me. The vaunt of your voice– honeyed and cloying. It consumed.
(Hydrangeas and Amaryllis) Vivid and bright, His terrible eyes scorched with hunger. “You need me,” he said. Certain, Absolute I fell, burned.
(Hydrangeas and Petunias) Steady. Fierce and vibrant, a tempest brewed in the wake of my gaze. Steady– a breath held between ruin and restraint. Steady, I remained as the archaic, poisoned honey of your words slowly dripped. Golden, venomous through the silence. Steady. Until my eyes snapped open, like thunder splitting the dark.
(Anemones) The quiet surrender between one heart beat and the next. No. The word rings hallowed and cold. Like the toll of death. No warmth can lay between us, between the beats that have long been silenced.
(Anemones and Rosemary) The ringing gripped its hands around my heart, a hymn of comfort– woven in static. Comforting, Overtaking.
(Anemones and Amaryllis) You are missing from me, in the protection that you wrought. Trapped and caged we become what we have always fought.
(Carnations, Baby's Breath, and Mint) You are missing from me, in the protection that you wrought. Trapped and caged we become what we have always fought.