Collective self is a long-term self-portrait project examining the relationship between body, memory, identity and decolonisation
Using my own image as both subject and medium, I document a body that exists between categories often presented as opposites: masculine and feminine, strength and fragility, visibility and erasure. The photographs trace a melanated, heavily tattooed body marked by scars, chronic pain, hypermobility and surgical intervention. They explore not only physical form but the histories carried within it.
The work is informed by female form, queer experience, race, disability, transformation and self-authorship. Skin becomes an archive. Tattoos become annotations. Scars become landmarks. Each image contributes to an evolving record of a life that resists simplification.
At its core, the project asks what remains when a person photographs themselves not to perform an identity, but to witness their own existence. The result is both personal archive and visual study: an attempt to leave behind evidence of having been here at all.