Shibari and Flowers with Ciencia

When Ciencia and I were planning this session, I had been thinking about my work, and how to better communicate the messages I try to put forward.

When people see my work, they are only seeing a slim glimpse of a day-long boudoir session, which is just a fragment of a staged moment in a woman’s life. So naturally, the interpretation of those images are shaped by assumptions about the woman’s appearance, what her personality is like, what her hopes and dreams might be. So, when the work primarily depicts women in lingerie or a sensual setting, one could easily assume that the subject is a professional model, or someone who regularly does this, even though the real-life person behind the image may have never done this before, or was feeling nervous or dealing with things in their personal life. I think that this dynamic, of only seeing the staged moment, may be the cause of some misunderstanding.

As an experiment, I decided to start the session with images that convey Ciencia as the normal woman she is— funny, relaxed, maybe a little reserved— before diving into the fantasy world of ropes and flowers.

As for the rope-art of shibari, what it means and how the flowers tie in, I’ll save that for the next blog post.

For now, enjoy this lovely session with Ciencia, on the day Winter in Los Angeles gave way into Spring.