Lately I have found myself drawn to movement. I have very limited experience with dance, in fact it began about a year ago as I joined an adult beginner ballet class. I was inspired to do so after seeing a performance by a member of the Louisville Ballet of “The Dying Swan.” Brought to tears, I realized that ballet was a source of beauty and inspiration to me. In my art I have also found it inspiring when directing models, finding cues from ballerina’s graceful movements. The latest project inspired by ballet are a set of self portraits I took at my grandmother’s house. This house has been a part of my family for several decades, and has thus left an impression on everyone in the family, including myself. With the changing of time and the passing of years, the house has altered in residence, the growing of a family within it, and it will continue to witness the changing of life within its walls. In this work, I wanted to use ballet coupled with light to explore the idea of new life coming into the aging home. The ballet figure is supposed to be somewhat transparent, to give emphasis to the light and to an idea of freshness in the space. The movement of the body also gives energy into the otherwise vacant space, and that of beauty as well as grace.

For this project I used a Canon 5D Mark ii, using the slowest shutter speeds that I could achieve with the natural light. I made the tutu as well, using the help of Rookie Magazine’s website. I was super satisfied with how the tutu turned out, and I used the measurements provided. The link is available here: http://rookiemag.com/2012/09/how-to-make-a-tutu/