Where the boundary between performer and observer blur, and both are
left exposed. The illusion is not just hers because it belongs to everyone watching.
People were never supposed to have mirrors. But what if they were exactly what we needed to allow for literal and emotional self-reflection. To stare at oneself for so long, you lose who you’re looking at. Like repeating a word over and over.
The reluctance to know oneself keeps her in rhythm. She has fabricated a persona of sorts, wearing it like a mask. The performance of self becomes default when the alternative is looking too closely. But to reinvent oneself is not human failure. Sometimes, over the years, we make the conscious decision to create a version of ourselves that we can actually like (the one the viewers like). Convincing yourself first makes for a better make-believe to the ones that just catch a glimpse.
We watch as she goes about life like a performer on stage, like an automaton in a factory. She is not deception. She is design.
Where authenticity is extinct, the manufactured live on.
Co-Creative Direction & Words by Elisabeth Edwards
Co-Creative Direction by Paige Albert
Styling by Anna Jara
Photography by Kiersten Cote
Talent by Charlotte Pinkerton