....you go in there and you cry. That's just what you do...
Your images hit differently. They make you feel...
...your exhibition helped me process some of the heavy issues from my past...
...what an incredible work with words...
Mothers of Stockholm
Wildest Dreams don't wait
I believe that everyone has a folder of their "Wildest Dreams" hidden somewhere in the back of their minds.
One of mine was to one day have the honour of presenting my view of the world through photo exhibition. I had no idea how and where, what about even, I just thought it'd be decades before I'd be potentially given the honour.
But as life is sometimes funny, by a complete accident, an opportunity presented itself this year in such perfect way that it wouldn't have turned out better if I planned it!
Life is The Greatest Poet. Even in Our Darkest Hour.
In the beginning of it all there was a young woman hurt by life because it took her mother away. She foolishly thought that the best thing she could do was to prove herself to everyone and to her angle mom by finishing law studies and becoming that important international lawyer in the big world she always claimed she'd be one day. What that young woman failed to see back then was how an unaddressed grief would slowly deplete her, until 5 years would pass and she'd find herself burned out, forced on sick leave at the age of 30.
That young woman was me. In my darkest hour when all dreams came crushing down and I lost my entire identity. But there was something good in all of it, hiding in plain sight. Because with my anxiety rising daily, my true passion for photography was growing too. In desperate attempts to heal and regain love for life I started to look at the world through my lens. Starting with walks in nature with my camera to heal, it quickly turned into conjuring my own stories to document and that eventually turned into telling stories of other people's lives, most of all - mothers.
Until here I was, 5 years later that I spent roaming Stockholm documenting memories for other mothers and their children, on the verge of turning 35, staring at instagram ad that screamed the words at me "LOOKING FOR ARTISTS TO EXHIBIT THEIR ART TO CELEBRATE INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY AS A PART OF OPENING OF A NEW ART CAFÉ IN STOCKHOLM!"
I read those words a few times and my heart started to race. Could I? Should I? Dare I?
THE LEGACY of a mother
The Legacy of a mother was a collection of my work accumulated in recent years as I've been documenting mothers of Stockholm in their most honest form throughout different stages of their lives.
This entire exhibition was built on the memory of my own mother who on International Women's Day on March 8 in 1990 did the most courageous thing a woman can do - gave life to me. And, 35 years later, on the same day, I was finally able to pay tribute to her as I've been dreaming to do ever since I lost her.
My mother nurtured me with her strength throughout my entire life. She showed me how unimaginably selfless the mother’s love is and what it can endure. And the very last thing she left me with was the ultimate evidence of it. For even in the last hours of her own life she did everything she could to shield me from pain of losing her. Blinded by my own grief for years, I couldn't decipher this important legacy before I myself started to document the bond that only mothers have power to nurture.
Documenting mothers of Stockholm in the recent years was the secret key that helped me unlock that legacy. It helped me heal my grief and the wounds it caused me. More importantly, witnessing the honest side of the mother-child bond during the photo sessions helped me create a new post-mortem relationship with my mom that is now inspiring me in the way I photograph.
Out of her legacy I created mine - to document the most important connection in its rawness during honest moments of everyday life when mother loves her child. For today, as I look at life from the other side, I know the memories of it will become that ones we'll yearn to preserve.
All of the photographs that were part of the exhibition were documented in "split of a second" moments conjured by real life. With no staging or control, it's a representation of pieces of the human soul these mothers have authentically given it when they surrendered all their heavy and ugly to my camera and transformed it into the joy of life.
Poetry & Photographs
I knew that just photographs wouldn't make the feeling complete. I wanted to create an immersive experience for all senses that would emphasise how honest raw moments of life, even the ones we feel are detrimental to us, in reality shape us to be the humans we are.
Just like myself, when I thought I was at my rock bottom and yet a new purpose was forming in my heart, born out of darkness yes, but illuminating my future. And just like for mothers who may struggle daily with feelings of not being enough, yet they mean the world to their children every day. Our perception can be so wrong if we focus on the negatives or worse, try to desperately chase perfections.
from the storyteller's pen
Over the past few years I was secretly writing poetry. I never showed those words to anyone other than posting a few verses to my instagram sometimes. But I knew that if I wanted to inspire others to be more vulnerable in their lives, I needed to start from myself...
And so I combined the photographs with the poems I accumulated over the years. I knew it was time for me to step out of my comfort zone and share the message I feel so strongly for. The message that guides me in my documentation of other people. Because our legacy is hidden in honest everyday existence, not in the empty picture perfect "realities" we chase to portray.
And just like the photographs, depicting real moments of life, so the verses too were inspired by real life, depicting either something that happened during my photo sessions or by vulnerable thoughts mothers shared with me about their journeys in intimate conversations.
It encompasses all those racing thoughts deep at night, those achy skips of heartbeat when you realise your child no longer needs you as they used to, that pain you try to rid them of when they're hurt, all those moments when you capture them as they grow while you're nowhere to be found in the pictures, those changes to the body and sacrifices you make to create new life, even the rocky, thorn-filled road to motherhood.
Designing the message
The Vision That Put it All Together
With the look of the exhibition I aimed to emphasise how those important moments of life, when mother gives her love, are fleeting - just a small fraction of passing time, attached to our minds almost only as a side note that in a heartbeat will fall off of the edge of our memories and be forgotten in the sea of musts and needs of everyday life. And yet those fleeting moments are where the mother's essence is hidden, where all the magic and happiness resides. And it is the mother who plants it there. In between all the chaos and struggles, in the tiny cracks, she plants her love and devotion and makes the life bloom.
I wanted the space to feel intimate, like a tiny corner where you go sit down to breathe and feel calm and so I illuminated the space with candlelight and put on a subtle sounds of beating heart.
place of honor
Letter for my Mom
as a tribute to her Memory & The Legacy She Planted in Me
At the centre of it all, I placed a memory of her together with the letter I wrote to her post mortem. She belonged there, right in the middle of the wall, surrounded by stories of mothers I documented to this day inspired by everything she did for me her entire life. For it was her and her legacy she left in my life, the very purpose she lead me to without either of us knowing at the time.
And where is the exhibition now?
What initially should had been just 1 day thing for the International Women's Day and opening of the Art Café Third Place, turned into almost month long exhibition.
Right now the exhibition is packed and carefully tucked away but the new things are coming...
New Purpose for "The Legacy of a Mother" is Coming Soon...
As it so happens in life, something wonderful and completely new was born out of this exhibition and I am so honoured to get to do this. I will share more details (watch my instagram) with the news soon but right now I am in the process of shaping the "The Legacy of a Mother" into something that will have a more permanent spot somewhere in Stockholm, with a new purpose.
This has been a little insight into my most vulnerable thoughts and I'm so grateful for everyone who took time to get all the way to the bottom of the page. Thank you for letting me share this with you. And if you feel like sharing yourself with me too, don't hesitate to reach out.
