Over the last few weeks, I have been working on a personal project in collaboration with The Trampery in which I have photographed members of their community and explored the effect that working in co-working spaces has on their ventures. The Trampery is a London-based social enterprise, specialising in shared workspace and support for entrepreneurs and creative businesses.
The project is called “De-Stress” because I am taking the portraits with my film camera and once the film is developed I dip the negatives in household chemicals to “distress” the images of these people who work in supportive communities that contribute to relieving their stress.
I visited all the sites that The Trampery has in London and photographed members of their different communities who volunteered for the project. After the portraits were taken, the participants were interviewed and asked questions like how do they think a creative environment like The Trampery contributes to the success rate of their business.
As soon as the film came back from the lab, I started the distressing phase. But, before dipping the negatives in the household chemicals, I blocked the eyes with a gel so that they were the only part of the image that was not affected by this technique. By doing this, the portraits were distressed except for the eyes in an attempt to convey that, even though the life of an entrepreneur is surrounded by uncertainty and stress, working in a supportive community helps them keep clarity and stay focused.
You can learn more about the project and see the resulting images, interviews and behind the scenes on The Trampery’s Instagram account @thetrampery.
Photo credit: behind the scenes by Tori Dance from The Trampery.
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