Photography Series
Massachusetts Regional Scholastic Art Awards
This three-piece photographic series was created in response to a sexual assault case at my school. Rather than depicting the event itself, the work focuses on its aftermath—silence, fragmentation, and the slow psychological negotiation between collapse and survival.
Each image uses symbolic objects, restrained body language, and controlled color lighting to translate internal states into visual form. Apples, masks, and physical restraint recur throughout the series, functioning as metaphors for temptation, imposed identity, and suppressed voice. Together, the photographs trace a progression from vulnerability, to confrontation, to enforced silence.
All three works received Silver Keys at the Massachusetts Regional Scholastic Arts & Writing Awards, recognized for their conceptual depth and visual cohesion.
Forbidden lure
Forbidden Lore focuses on vulnerability under scrutiny. The apples sit close to the subject’s body, creating discomfort rather than temptation. They reference how narratives of blame and responsibility are often projected onto survivors.
The tight framing and red lighting place the subject in an exposed position, reflecting the pressure to explain or justify one’s existence after harm has already occurred.
Between death and rebirth
In Between Death and Rebirth, the subject holds a skeleton as if confronting a version of herself that no longer exists. The skeleton represents the loss of a former identity rather than literal death.
The image exists in a suspended moment—neither collapse nor recovery. It reflects the in-between state after trauma, where something has ended, but nothing has fully begun again.
Silenced
Silenced addresses the aftermath of being discouraged from speaking. The taped mouth symbolizes both external pressure and internal fear—what happens when silence feels safer than truth.
The scattered apples remain in the frame as quiet reminders that the experience does not disappear just because it is no longer spoken. The stillness of the image reflects how pain is often expected to remain contained and unseen.
