Double exposure project (2021)

Background:

In 2017, Aine Belton kindly invited me to be part of her book, Double Exposure: Portrait Series: Cyclists of Toronto. It was through her work that I was introduced to making double exposures.

Premise:

During the COVID-19 pandemic, I thought a lot about how much human connection was being expressed using video calling--how it worked, what it looked like, and what it felt like.  

In most video call formats, one person’s main screen displays the image of the person with whom they are connecting, while a second, embedded window displays their image.  In this way, one person’s time and space is layered on top of the time and space of someone else.  Double exposures on film are similar. Overlaying the images creates something bigger and different than either single image and expresses connection.

Inspired by Aine’s work, I reached out to some friends who enjoy film photography. Aine and Lucas agreed to be part of the project.

Concept:

I sent Aine and Lucas each two rolls of film. On Roll #1, I had made exposures of things that I wanted to show and share specifically with each of them. Roll #2 was fresh. Aine and Lucas made exposures on both rolls of the things that they wanted to show and share with me. I then made exposures on their Roll #2’s. This format attempted to mirror the format of a video chat.

Below are a few selected images from these collections.