“From the moment I looked through the lens of my first camera, photography has been a part of me. I instinctively found in it something captivating, intriguing and reassuring. And I loved it. I suppose much like the first creative act. And as a constant, I have not had to seek too far to find my transitional objects – a never-ending collection of cameras and countless subjective-objects in the form of photographs, collecting dust, having served their purpose as symbolic equivalents of my freedom of metaphor!”

Born in Nairobi, I became interested in photography at a young age, learning to use analogue cameras and traditional monochrome printing. It was only after transitioning to digital in 2010, whilst remaining true to the realms of analogue, that I discovered waterscape and more recently infrared photography.

 

For me photography is a solitary pursuit, and during my quests I became aware of a strange and deepening quietness, a slowing down of feverish time. Increasingly I began to feel a heightened significance, a deep experience of personal presence, and connection with my subjects.

It was only years later, whilst studying a masters in clinical organisational psychology at INSEAD, that I began to understand this experience as “aesthetic moments” (a psychodynamic concept), when we feel a deep subjective experience of objects, as part of self-transformation.

“Unknowingly and only now comprehensible looking backward, today, photography serves as the end, not the means. It is the outcome of a solitary wondering; a look without focus. A psychic prayer waiting for the arrival of the next transitional object to find me, inviting me to have a conversation with it, and allowing me to capture it..”

I also discovered that photographers are given a means to know the world that transcends language, and at their best, photographers deliberately start with their known feeling state. The experience of the object precedes the knowing of the object. And their challenge is not simply to see the reality before them, but also the invisible within.

Today, I live in Nairobi, and continue my solitary wanderings mainly in East Africa, Seychelles and Scotland. I continue to explore what the camera and the photographic process can do without any interference except one’s vision. To help us to look at all things and understand their meaning.