A portrait is the photograph of a person, captured usually within a fracture of a second. It’s intended to display the personality of the subject but often it’s just a way to show the best version of someone – not neccessary the most honest one.
Long portraits have been around for a while. They are similar to a photograph but instead of catching a short moment in time through photography, the moment of being portrayed is extended to a minute or more and captured on video. When being photographed, we try to show the camera a version of ourselves that we want the viewer to see. After a while though, a subject’s face will inevitably relax and show more of what’s behind the facade we all put up when having a camera pointed at our face.
It’s an intense experience for both sides – the subject staring at a camera for a couple minutes and the viewer to watch someone’s face that closely for an extended period of time.
I’ve been toying with this idea for a long time and I finally came up with a version of a portrait that evokes something in me. In the end, I always look for the story. A face on camera may be able tell this story but not everybody wants to listen to it. So to make people listen, I decided to mix this recording with snippets of the subject’s voice, uncovering more of who they are. In the end, I ended up with video portraits of people that to me are fascinating, telling and intense.
To kick this series off, let me introduce you to Chrissa.
Chrissa and I work together and when I was looking for volunteers to try this idea with, she was one of the first people to reach out to me.
Chrissa is from Greece, Crete to be precise, but she lives in Brighton. She’s funny and sweet and loves coffee. And despite knowing her for over a year, this project showed me new aspects of her. She’s also extremely easy to photograph since she’s absolutely gorgeous.
Over the next few weeks I will release a few more of those long portraits but if you like the idea and are interested to take part, feel free to reach out to me.
