An Unprecedented Year - In Photographs
For a handful of years now my New Year’s practice has been to choose a word of the year. I’ve chosen words like Brave. Expansive. Dream.
In 2018 I started a new practice: The 365 Project. (Click to see 2018’s results.) An assignment for myself to shoot (at least) one photo everyday. It wound up being a beast of a creative and logistical endeavor - so much editing! - so when 2019 rolled around I took a year off.
January 2020, at my daughter’s urging, I picked the 365 Project back up. I thought it might be a challenge, but it couldn’t be any harder than my inaugural project, right?
When March hit, and Maine saw her first case of COVID, I might have had some conversations with myself about the word I chose for 2020: Intuition.
None of us had any idea that 2020 would unfold the way it did, and the irony of my word choice wasn’t lost on me. But Intuition is more instinct than reason, and in moments of frustration and fear I came back to the intention I set in January. To trust myself. And shoot every damn day.
There were many days when motivation lacked, but I’m tenacious, and I made a promise, so I followed through. The act of holding my eye to the lens didn’t change the murky timeline that 2020 often was, but it created space for me to observe my life in a regular and routine fashion - two words that 2020 lacked! It also created an invaluable visual time capsule of this upside down year.
There are fewer friends - and fewer embraces! - showcased in 2020's slideshow.
(Click here to view 2020’s 365 Project)
There are plenty of self portraits and still life’s. I experimented with double exposure and smoke. My dress rack wasn’t being used by clients, so my daughter used it instead. We nested. We got a tv. We played in Maine’s wild expanse hiking constantly, lucky that Casco Bay is a few steps from our front door. Nature gave me refuge and room to roam during this claustrophobic year. I now consider myself an amateur birder!
My business was put on hold for 3 months as we all waited to find out how the intimate work of portrait photography could be done safely and to the professional and creative standards my brand has set. But through it all, I was still a photographer.
My income went away, but my purpose didn’t.
This time of year comes with a lot of reflection. We think about the things we did “right” or “wrong” which is basically a judgmental way of saying we think of how we might do things differently. Steeping in Intuition - really embracing and embodying that word - helped inform my word of the year for 2021:
Alchemy
The practice of fundamentally changing substances. Transformation heavily informed by creation. And magic.
This year I’ll incorporate last year’s lessons- the ones that took place inside my doorstep and outside of it. I’ve got no space for being busy just for busy’s sake.
This year I’m embodying the change that needs to happen for me, my daughter, and the world we live in.
What’s your intention for 2021?
We choose it in the first light of the year. Before the landscape is illuminated. Before we realize that the terrain we’re so familiar with has shifted and changed.
Because shift and change are constant - but what we choose to do with them, that’s where the practice of intuitive Alchemy can begin.
If this practice resonates, and you find yourself picking a word for the year, please hit reply to email me and share! I’d love to know what word you’d like to embody this year.
Yours In Alchemy - and bravery, expansiveness, and dreamy intuition!
Jen
