My ongoing body of work attempts to engage with an intangible space just beyond the foreground of the photograph.

L’appel du vide, or the “call of the void,” refers to the disorienting feeling you may experience when at a great height, when standing at the edge of a pit, or when confronted with oncoming traffic. For a split second, you may feel an urge to jump from a building or to throw yourself into a hurtling train.

While some may link this feeling with passive suicidal ideation, others have theorized that it is a temporarily misunderstood signal in your brain; when presented with a dangerous situation, you imagine the outcome, but then affirm your ongoing will to live.

I confront this phenomenon through a series of self-portraits and still life photographs across broad expanses of glowing color created in the studio. My imagery is particularly indebted to the work of George Platt Lynes, whose male nudes could never be exhibited during his lifetime, and James Bidgood, whose fantastical creations remain wildly under-appreciated. Both artists are crucial to the development of art and fashion photography, but are rarely credited for their enduring influence.