Project Statement and Part One statement

Today, as I write this, I would have been celebrating 4 years of happiness with the love of my life. However, love is far too interesting to have let that happen. I am only twenty-three, I know I am young. Yet, I feel that I already have a story of love and loss, and love, to tell.

              In the past I have done projects on my sisters, and mother, and our connection as women in the world. I also did a project on women in general, and our struggle within a judgmental society. I feel that I have done these projects to learn more about my journey as a woman. After every project I do, I reflect and think about what I’ve learned. Doing those projects actually contributed to my growth during my breakup, and my reunion with my boyfriend, Clay. I realized that I hadn’t looked at my journey with this person I had seen almost every day for 4 years.

This is why I have chosen to create a photo narrative of my relationship with Clay from beginning to end. I hope to connect more with him, on a different level, as we shoot photos together. I also hope to learn more about our connection as I attempt to illustrate both of our emotions, together and separate, within different phases of our past.

This is a very personal approach for a project. However, I believe all my past projects have been personal, this one is just about a relationship between two people, rather than a group. I hope to not become cliché or too romantic with this project. I would like it to have more personality and depth. I am also trying to not do double exposures, however I’m not promising anything.

Part 1: “My Love For You Is Pure and True”

When Clay and I first got together, we were very romantic. He always took me on dates to eat, and to the movies, he always drove, and he always paid. We saw one another just about every day. We were obsessed. The honeymoon phase was fully activated. I was eighteen, and he was nineteen. I was in my second year of college, and unemployed, he was taking online classes, and working at a tomato factory. I had only had two boyfriend before him, lasting 2 months and 2 weeks in all. He had just gotten out of a relationship that really messed with his head and heart, a year prior. I know we are still young now, yet I can’t help to think “We were so young.” We tried so hard to do things the way couples were supposed to. We celebrated our “anniversary” every month. He spoiled me to no end with gifts and attention. We really were happy, but it felt as though I were in a dream state

For this first part, I wanted to express emotions of the intimacy and closeness that we felt when we first got together. The loveydoveiness. I attempted this with the emphasis on hands, faces, and touch. I mean come on, we don’t touch other peoples’ faces unless we love them. I wanted to give the photos a strong blown out basic white background, to represent the simplicity of our beginnings, and pure heartedness that it began with. It was simple: we wanted to be together. Nothing else mattered. Right?



The title for part 1: "My Love For You Is Pure and True" is a phrase from a poem Clay wrote me before we parted ways. This photo is the first photo we took together as boyfriend and girlfriend.