Emotions are categorised using words such as love, happiness, pleasure, fear and vulnerability. Every photograph here is a brief of moment of stillness and connection between myself and the animal/(s) where we both replace fear with love and vulnerability. Allowing the animals ethereal beauty, emotions and personality to be felt by viewers of the photographs. My hope in photography has always been to help one connect with the animal and therefore work towards their conversation and protection of them.
Each of these photographs taken often with tears filling my mask represents some of the most life-changing and emotional times of my life. Brings tears to my eyes truly just reliving these moments in my heart and head and remembering how despite whatever I was going through at that time, they gave me a greater appetite, appreciation and love for every moment of my life. And knowing how just like that your whole life can change, often for the better.
Each photo represents a moment of deep connection, trust and love with the subject/(s). They are presented in the order they were taken. I started my career photographing single animals, intrigued and drawn to connecting with them through their eyes and breath. I’m currently pregnant so I have in more recent times found more connection with families/schools of marine life and the beautiful connection between mother humpback whales and their calves. Each of these photographs was an extremely emotional for me. I would surface often screaming with immense joy or be so struck by the beauty of what I’d seen, felt and experienced I would be lost for words.
I’ve learnt through photography that we are all the same. Humans and animals. We all have distinct personalities. And we have the same emotions love, happiness, pleasure, joy, fear and vulnerability. Through understanding this we are able to move and connect with animals and learn and grow from each other.