Reflections of identity
This photography project explores identity, perception and the fluid nature of the self through experimental portraiture. Using water-filled glass vessels, reflections, distortion and multiple exposures, I manipulated facial features to challenge how we perceive ourselves and others. Through dramatic lighting, dark backgrounds and sequential compositions, I investigated how movement and fragmented imagery can communicate different emotional states. I also experimented with image manipulation in Adobe Photoshop, layering and distorting photographs to create abstract forms that transform the human face and explore the complexity of identity.
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Transformation Through Motion
This photography project explores transformation through the movement of the human body, capturing the subtle changes in posture and expression over time. Inspired by Eadweard Muybridge and Étienne-Jules Marey, I created a series of stop-frame photographs documenting different stages of movement. I set up a dark studio with a strong light source positioned to the left, using chiaroscuro to create dramatic contrasts between light and shadow and emphasise the three-dimensional form of the face. I then experimented with overlapping exposures and sequential compositions to visualise movement, revealing how a single identity can shift through time, gesture and emotion.
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Symbiosis Through Reflection
Inspired by Ziqianqian Liu’s Second Dimension series, I explored the relationship between humans and nature through experimental still-life photography. I tested different compositions using flowers, hands and a circular mirror, investigating how reflections could create symmetry and visual ambiguity. By photographing a suspended bouquet with and without a hand, I explored how human presence changes the composition and suggests a connection between ourselves and the natural world.
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Seen Versus Unseen
In these experiments, I explored different ways of photographing flowers, faces and hands through tracing paper. By changing the placement of each subject, with flowers in front of the paper and faces or hands behind it, or vice versa, I investigated how depth, focus and visibility can transform an image. The translucent surface softens and obscures details, creating a sense of distance and mystery while revealing glimpses of form and expression. These experiments further developed my concept of the seen versus unseen, highlighting how subtle changes in composition can transform the relationship between the natural world and human presence.
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Becoming Nature
I created a series of experimental self-portraits using translucent fabric, flowers and foliage to explore the shifting boundaries between human identity and the natural world. Working with my tutor as a model, I draped the fabric across the face and body, incorporating botanical forms that partially concealed and transformed the figure. Through close-up compositions, dramatic lighting and muted violet tones, I blurred the distinction between skin, textile and plant structures. The fabric became both a veil and a second skin, suggesting that nature is not simply something we observe, but something with which we are intrinsically connected. By obscuring facial features, I challenged the conventions of traditional portraiture, shifting the focus from individual identity towards a more abstract, organic sense of self.
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Distorted Presence
Inspired by the work of Casper Faassen, I explored the relationship between distance and intimacy through a translucent barrier. I photographed close-up portraits through plastic sheeting, creating blurred and fragmented views of the face. The plastic distorts facial features, softening their contours while revealing glimpses of expression, reflecting the complex nature of identity as something simultaneously visible and hidden. I also experimented with my subject pulling and stretching the plastic, bringing parts of the hands into sharp focus while the face remained obscured. This interaction created a sense of tension, suggesting a desire to break through the barrier and be seen while highlighting the difficulty of capturing a fully defined identity.
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Between Past and Future
Inspired by Suzanne Jongmans’ reinterpretation of historical portraiture through contemporary materials, I created my own photographic response exploring the relationship between technology, identity and confinement. I styled my model in rich blue fabric, combining it with bubble wrap and translucent plastic packaging to evoke the silhouettes and textures of classical portraits. I experimented with different poses and arrangements of the materials, partially concealing the face and body to create a tension between elegance and restriction. By placing these synthetic materials against traditional forms of clothing, I explored how objects designed for convenience and protection can become symbols of entrapment. The portraits reflect my Human Machine concept, questioning whether the technologies and materials we create to improve our lives ultimately begin to control us.
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The Human Machine: Light and Movement
Inspired by the growing impact of electronic waste, I developed my Human Machine concept by incorporating a real human figure into my experiments with light. Using LEDs and a fibre-optic lamp, I projected coloured light across the body to create the illusion of electronic circuits spreading across the skin. I experimented with the lamp’s position and movement, discovering that long-exposure photography and a low ISO produced the most effective results. The light source itself disappeared, leaving only luminous blue, green and violet trails that seemed to merge with the figure. Through these experiments, I explored how technology can become an extension of the human body, blurring the boundary between the organic and the mechanical. The resulting images portray a futuristic figure overwhelmed by the technological environment, questioning whether our relationship with technology is transforming us into machines.
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Water: Purification, Renewal and Reflection
As part of my Elements photography book, I explored water as a symbol of purification, renewal and reflection, capturing its movement, changing colours and connection to Balinese spiritual traditions. Inspired by Bali’s spiritual traditions and the close relationship between people and their natural environment, I documented how water connects physical landscapes with cultural rituals and personal healing. Through photography, I investigated the movement, transparency and reflective qualities of water, capturing moments that suggest transformation and inner balance. This chapter examines how water becomes more than a natural element: it acts as a bridge between nature, spirituality and human experience, encouraging me to reflect on how our surroundings shape our sense of connection and renewal.
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Fire: Ritual, Transformation and Energy
As part of my Elements photography book, I documented the Agni Hotra fire ceremony, exploring fire as a symbol of purification, transformation and spiritual renewal. Photographing the ritual while participating in the experience challenged me to balance observation with immersion. Through capturing the preparation of the fire, the offerings and the participants’ meditative gestures, I sought to convey the ceremony’s atmosphere and emotional intensity. The warm glow
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Ether and Community: The Unseen Connections
As part of my Elements photography book, I explored the relationship between spirituality, intuition and community. Through photographing temple rituals, handmade offerings, prayers and moments of collective worship, I sought to capture both the visible traditions and the invisible connections that give them meaning. I was particularly interested in how spirituality brings people together, creating a shared sense of belonging through family, ritual and cultural identity. By documenting intimate gestures alongside wider views of communal ceremonies, I explored how individual acts of devotion become part of something greater. These photographs reveal my fascination with the unseen forces that connect people to one another, their ancestors and the natural world.
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Earth: Roots, Resilience and Belonging
As part of my Elements photography book, I also explored earth as a symbol of grounding, strength and our connection to the natural world. I photographed the intricate roots of ancient trees, moss-covered surfaces and the relationship between the human body and the landscape. Through contrasting close-up details with wider compositions, I sought to reveal the textures, patterns and quiet complexity of the environment. I was particularly drawn to the way roots intertwine and grow around one another, creating a visual metaphor for interconnectedness. These photographs reflect my interest in how nature offers a sense of stability and belonging, reminding us that we are not separate from our surroundings, but deeply rooted within them.
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Ocean Light
As part of my Elements photography book, I also captured the beach, shifting waves and sunsets to explore the relationship between water, light and transformation. I was drawn to the way the changing sky reflected across the ocean, creating contrasts between deep blues, muted pinks and glowing amber tones. Through close-up studies of rippling water and wider coastal compositions, I documented the movement of the sea as it transitioned from daylight into darkness. The reflections of the setting sun became a visual metaphor for renewal and impermanence, capturing fleeting moments when the landscape seemed to dissolve into colour and light. These photographs invite the viewer to slow down and experience nature as something constantly changing yet deeply grounding.
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Air: Breath, Movement, Space and Presence
In these photographs, I explored air as an element through its invisible yet powerful presence. I wanted to capture how air moves through space, in the rising smoke of incense, the shifting mist over the landscape and the flow of wind through trees and open structures. The smoke from offerings became a visual representation of breath, intention and connection, while the soft atmospheric light and movement in the environment highlighted the constant change and fluidity of air. These images reflect my interest in the unseen elements that surround us, reminding us to slow down, breathe and be present within nature.
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Reconstructed Identities
Building on my lumen print experiments, I used Adobe Photoshop to explore colour inversion, layering and overlapping compositions. These digital manipulations transformed the original prints into abstract forms and unexpected colour relationships, blurring the boundaries between photography and abstraction.
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Floral Deconstruction
Inspired by Simone Rocha’s Spring/Summer 2024 collection, I explored the relationship between flowers, textiles and the human body. I experimented with sewing fresh lilies and roses into translucent fabric, pinning and stitching the petals to create delicate, sculptural forms. I also developed textile encasings to partially conceal the flowers, exploring how natural materials can become integrated into fabric. Finally, I scanned the stitched flowers to capture their intricate textures and delicate structures, documenting the transformation of organic forms through textile experimentation.
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Lumen Transformations
I experimented with lumen printing, cutting out human silhouettes and layering them with botanical forms to create abstract photographic compositions. By testing different arrangements and exposures, I explored how light transforms shapes, producing soft pink and purple tones, overlapping forms and unexpected patterns. This process allowed me to investigate transformation through the interaction of light, shadow and the human figure.
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An Immersive Botanical Installation
I developed these installation ideas through experiments with translucent fabrics, stitched flowers, leaves and dried botanical materials. Inspired by suspended textile artworks, I envisioned a three-dimensional arrangement in which the individual pieces hang at different heights, allowing the viewer to experience the work from multiple perspectives. I also explored how strong, directional lighting could transform the installation, casting enlarged shadows and creating an abstract, almost dreamlike atmosphere. Through photographic tests using long exposures and overlapping images, I investigated how light, movement and transparency could offer new ways of seeing the relationship between nature and textiles.
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Projected Identities
I experimented with light projection, movement and image manipulation to explore how identity can be fragmented and transformed through photography. By projecting portraits onto another person’s face, I created overlapping features that blurred the boundaries between individuals, producing unexpected expressions and distorted compositions. I also tested geometric patterns and layered cyanotype prints with photographic portraits in Adobe Photoshop. These experiments allowed me to investigate how light, shadow and superimposition can challenge the idea of a fixed identity, revealing the face as something fluid, shifting and open to reinterpretation.
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Impact: The Growing Weight of E-Waste
For my Impact project, I collected discarded electronic devices and cables to investigate the environmental consequences of technological consumption and overconsumption. Inspired by research into the growing volume of electronic waste, I arranged the collected objects into different sculptural compositions against a deep blue background. I experimented with suspending tangled cables and stacking obsolete keyboards, chargers and devices to transform everyday waste into an unsettling visual installation. The contrast between the controlled studio setting and the chaotic accumulation of objects highlights the tension between technological progress and environmental damage. By photographing these arrangements from different perspectives, I wanted to communicate how products that once represented innovation quickly become unwanted, accumulating into a persistent form of pollution that does not simply disappear.
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Inspired by Man Ray
Inspired by Man Ray’s experimental rayographs, I explored how manipulating photographic images could transform everyday objects into abstract compositions. His use of negative space, unusual arrangements and darkroom experimentation challenged traditional approaches to photography, revealing new ways of creating images. I was particularly interested in how abstraction allows viewers to interpret images freely, leaving room for personal associations and multiple meanings. Building on this research, I created my own image manipulations by experimenting with layering, silhouettes and contrasts between light and shadow. These experiments became the foundation for digitally recreating the visual qualities of cyanotype, allowing me to transform familiar forms through colour, contrast and image manipulation into unexpected abstract compositions.
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The Human Machine
I created a sculptural head wrapped in discarded electronic materials, using tangled cables and a toner cartridge bag to explore the relationship between humanity and technology. Inspired by the growing accumulation of e-waste, I wanted to represent how constant exposure to electronic devices can make us feel increasingly disconnected from our own humanity, almost as if we are becoming machines ourselves. Using long-exposure photography, I experimented with different aperture and ISO settings to capture the movement of light around the sculpture, creating blurred, electric forms against a dark background. I also inverted the colours in Adobe Photoshop to test alternative visual effects. Through these experiments, I transformed the head into a hybrid figure, symbolising how technology surrounds, consumes and gradually reshapes our identities.
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Lola Kadas
Hi, my name is Lola!
My interest in photography originated from my fascination with psychology and the complexity of human emotions. I became curious about how we experience the world internally, how we process difficult feelings, and how we find ways to understand ourselves. This led me to photography as a means of exploring emotions that are often difficult to express through words. I see it as a form of healing, offering me a space for reflection, self-discovery and emotional expression.
This interest developed through my first project, in which I explored identity and the relationship between our inner worlds and how we present ourselves to others. It later evolved into my second project, Elements, which I developed in Bali. Here, I investigated how healing can emerge through our connection with nature, spirituality, cultural traditions and community.
Inspired by Balinese cosmology and the five elements of Panca Maha Bhuta, I explored water as a symbol of cleansing and renewal, fire as transformation, and earth as a source of grounding. Photographing purification rituals, spiritual offerings, ancient trees and moments of contemplation allowed me to explore how our surroundings can influence our emotional wellbeing. Meeting a traditional Balinese healer further deepened my curiosity about different approaches to healing and the importance of human connection.
I am drawn to contrasts between darkness and light, movement and stillness, vulnerability and resilience. I find inspiration in fleeting moments, natural textures and details that evoke emotion or reveal something unexpected. Researching photographers such as Rinko Kawauchi and Rio Helmi has helped me explore how light, composition and atmosphere can communicate ideas beyond what is immediately visible.
Through my photographic projects, I continue to explore the relationship between psychology, nature and healing. I am interested in how images can make abstract feelings tangible and encourage us to look beyond surface appearances. For me, photography is a way of understanding myself and the world around me, while creating space for contemplation, connection and renewal.