Supplication, 2011 - present

Supplication consists of portraits of women incarcerated in the Montana Women’s Prison in Billings, in a style reminiscent of the early 20th century portraits. I used a large-format camera and Instant film to replicate this style. It isolates the prisoners in a very shallow depth-of-field and reveals realistic detail. This isolation and detail adds an aura of mystery, poetry, and sometimes tragedy to the countenances of the inmates.

This project was my personal response to the ubiquitous presence of mug-shoots in the local paper. These photographs are meant to document a transgressor, but act to criminalize individuals and strip them of identity and sympathy; the frequency of these images can cause other members of the same community to feel unsafe and untrusting of strangers. By going into the prison and making sympathetic portraits, I was interested in seeing and sharing the human side of the transgressor. I also wanted to give back to them for showing me this honesty by creating images of places they missed, which I will return to them. Within the prison, these women create new homes, new communities, and they relearn appropriate behavior in those spaces, so when they are released, they can make better choices.

Because I am interested in collaboration and wanted to avoid exploiting these women, each sitter worked with me to choose a pose that best represented her. Additionally, I volunteered to make a photograph of something outside the prison in exchange for their sitting. I am interested in the dialogue that takes place between these two images. Where, outside the prison, would one miss the most? I was asked to photograph houses from important times in their life, sunrises, sunsets, mountains, kittens, graves, stores, etc. The women are allowed to have small photographs, so they will have the images of people they miss: husbands, children, family and friends. Where are the photographs they are surprised to miss?