Your Trusted Partner for Affordable Photography Essentials, Backed by Quality and Care

Dana Stirling And Her Poetic Depiction of Mental Health


“When I photograph, I feel like I’m not just trapped under the cloud, but I’m holding that umbrella, trying to shelter myself in some way,” says photographer Dana Stirling, whose work, at first glance, reminds you of poetry you read on a sunny morning during your younger years. However, when you revisit the poem when you are much wiser, you truly grasp the meaning hiding beneath the beautiful words. Stirling’s latest series, Why Am I Sad, evokes similar emotions. When you scratch beneath its captivating surface, you discover themes of loneliness, sorrow, a vital discourse on mental health, and the role of photography in it all.

The images are by Dana Stirling; used with permission. You can follow her work on her website, or her Instagram @dana_stirling. The article was written with inputs from Chris Gampat.

Beauty and Sadness Intertwined

According to the World Health Organization, about 280 million people suffer from depression, and about 50% of women have been diagnosed with it. As a person who has been diagnosed with depression herself, Dana Stirling’s moving series provides an intimate glimpse into what it feels like to work with a condition that many are unable to see. “Photography is my way of communicating with the world. I’m not always able to articulate in words how I feel or how depression has impacted my life,” she reveals to The Phoblographer in an exclusive interview.

The images, often captured in bright light, feel like a warm, comforting hug. However, when you view them with more care, you notice hidden metaphors subtly woven into every layer of the image. This notion also parallels how sadness works in real life; like these pictures, sadness requires time and patience to be understood. For instance, the photograph of pink balloons trapped in a house may appear like a scene from a Disney movie, but upon closer inspection, it can be interpreted as feelings that are bubbling up yet being forced to shut down.”There are metaphors and symbolism in the work, yet at the same time, the surface reality holds its own importance,” Dana Stirling tells us about the motifs. “These layers are what give the work its depth, mirroring the complexity of human emotions,” she adds.

Sadness, for example, often hides beneath layers of routine, the brave face we show to the world, and the daily grind. You have to look closely to uncover what lies beneath the surface. In the same way, my images may appear as simple still lifes at first glance—captured moments that seem beautiful—but beneath them, there can be an undercurrent of sadness and heaviness that reflects my own emotions as the artist.

Dana Stirling

Like the balloons, one will also notice red dots and smiley faces in day-to-day settings. They may appear like staged images, but Stirling states such moments would “arrive naturally” as she simply captures what she observed. “I never set out to find them (smileys); they found me,” she explains. Furthermore, each element in her work was included to resolve her journey. “The images are a mirror of my inner world, a reflection of how I see life and how I see myself navigating through it,” she adds. The vivid colors, which also play a role in elevating her photographs, were captured with a Mamiya RZ 67 film camera, a 110mm lens, and the Kodak Ektar 100 film. She also uses a tripod but prefers to keep her kit “minimal but effective.”

How Dana Sterling Turned to Photography

For Dana Stirling, photography happened when she was in high school. Born in Israel, her need to pick up the camera arose when she wanted to process her emotions, especially sadness. “It brought me a sense of comfort, though, at the time, I couldn’t quite understand why. I saw it as a hobby, nothing more,” she tells us. Growing up in a small town, Sterling never felt at ease, and when she immigrated to the United States, these feelings continued to weigh her down. “As a child of immigrants, I found myself living in a duality that often left me feeling like an outsider in both worlds,” she wrote about the work.

As time passed by, she realized that photography had become “a companion, almost like an emotional lifeline.” In many ways, image-making helped her to comprehend her sadness in a way that no other art form could. “The act of creating helps me to cope, but it also provides a kind of distance from the sadness itself,” she states. “When I photograph, I feel like I’m not just trapped under the cloud, but I’m holding that umbrella, trying to shelter myself in some way. Photography doesn’t remove the sadness, but it gives me a means to navigate it,” she adds.

Photography is essential to how I navigate life, but it’s not always easy, and the pressure to create can sometimes feel overwhelming.

Dana Stirling

With a photo book ready, the photographer reflects that the images she created are, in some ways, an “echo” of her mother’s struggle with clinical depression. She reveals that her mother’s pain became intertwined with her own. Furthermore, as her relationship evolved with the medium, Dana Stirling realized that while photography was her anchor, it also presented a challenge. “On one hand, it’s my savior, giving me a way to express and process what I feel. But on the other hand, it can also feel like a tormentor, especially when I’m in a dark place and unable to create,” she says. However, despite this, Stirling continues to embrace the artistic medium for its duality.

The Role of Technology

As an analog photographer, Dana Stirling never felt that film and digital couldn’t co-exist. “I believe that each has its own value and purpose, and it’s about finding what makes sense for you and your work,” she shares. However, with the boom of AI-generated images, she feels that such works often lack profoundness. “In many ways, it lacks the emotional depth and complexity that comes from the human experience—the kind that only someone standing behind the canvas, whatever form that canvas may take, can truly bring,” she adds.

On a broader discussion about art and photography, Stirling states that AI has added to the growing chasm between art and content. “Art requires thought, emotion, and often, vulnerability from the artist, whereas content tends to be more disposable,” she explains. However, AI-generated images are produced quickly, thus, blurring the line between art and content even more. “For me, photography is about telling a story, sharing an experience, and creating something that connects on a deeper level, which is something I think AI still struggles to achieve,” she adds.

Through Dana Sterling’s work, we explore how art can be cathartic but also the very thing that pushes us to our limits. At the same time, she reminds us to support individuals who struggle with mental health and destigmatize the subject as much as possible. Many may appear to be fine on the surface, but there is an internal battle that is fought everyday to not lose a piece of one’s self. The project may be about one’s challenging journey, in the end, it ultimately serves as a reminder of human spirit and resilience.

AUTHENTICITY STATEMENT

The Phoblographer works with human photographers to verify that they’ve actually created their work through shoots. These are done by providing us assets such as BTS captures, screenshots of post-production, extra photos from the shoot, etc. We do this to help our readers realize that this is authentically human work. Here’s what this photographer provided for us.





Source link

We will be happy to hear your thoughts

Leave a reply

DPSaver
Logo
Register New Account
Compare items
  • Total (0)
Compare
0
Shopping cart