In May of 2020, I found roller skating, the hobby that would reconnect me with my inner child. It introduced me to a new way of being creative, and I became obsessed with learning new tricks and creating fun videos to go with my journey. The downfall though is that I can become a little too obsessed with one single hobby, and when I go through time periods where it doesn’t feel quite as fun, or I’m frustrated with my progress… well, it just really impacts my mental health.
As my frustration with skating has increased over the past couple of months, photography was suddenly on my mind again. It was something I was obsessed with as a teenager, particularly taking self-portraits. I was a bit of a loner in high school and I found a whole community online that was as passionate about photography as I was. Hundreds of teenagers were supporting each other artwork through Instagram. It was something that I think was really special, and although there was of course drama, I created a bond with so many people that lived so far from me.
I’ve missed how I could express myself through art in a different way, so in December I had an idea that I would take a self-portrait every day in 2022. I think I honestly do work best when I throw myself into something, for years I went to the gym almost every day, for 18 months I had been roller skating almost everyday, I could do something as simple as taking a photo of myself everyday too. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not always easy, but I’m working on accepting that not every day is going to reflect the growth and that some days I might struggle for ideas.
In fact, I think one of my weaknesses with photography is coming up with conceptual and creative shots. That’s one thing that’s been on my mind a lot recently. I’m confident that I have an eye for taking photos, I’ve worked very hard on my poses and expressions. But man, when it comes to concepts of telling a story I really struggle. I’m hoping that is something I will be able to work on throughout this year. I don’t want my photos to just be aesthetically pleasing.
So today marks one month of taking a self-portrait every day. Well, really it’s become having a full photoshoot instead of just one picture.. I have a hard time stopping taking photos once I get started. Which was fine when I was living in California, but the other day I almost froze my fingers off since I’m now in Boston and we just had a blizzard. Yes, I took photos in a blizzard!!
I’m at a mixture of feeling very proud of myself and a bit frustrated. I was overwhelmed by the support that I was getting in the beginning, but now I’m worried that people are becoming bored of it and seeing my face so much.
I want this project to be for me, but I sadly also rely a lot on validation from others as well. When I post a set of photos and I get absolutely no feedback, I become anxious that I’m just constantly throwing my face in people’s feeds without even creating good art. Again, the photos can be aesthetically pleasing but are they anything more than that? Am I even as creative as I tell myself I am? Is this just all a vanity thing? I don’t know.
This post has been a little more negative than I intended… but I think it’s good to be honest with how I’m feeling. My goal for the next month is to create more conceptual art and maybe even get into photoshop a little bit more. I have had so much support for this project and I want to really acknowledge that, thank you to all of those that have told me that they’re so excited to see I’m doing this project. I’m going to attempt to do daily blog posts about this too.. so we’ll see how that goes!
