Talk to ViewFinders Photo Club

Talk to ViewFinders

Photo Club

Brussels 13 March 2023

Illness

and how its shaped my photography over the past 6 years.

Katherine Maguire ARPS

I was invited to be the guest speaker at the ViewFinders club meeting on the 13 March. I gave my talk about my photography over the past 6 years, and how it has been influenced by my illnesses.

My talk focused on the 2 major projects that I have worked on.

The first project “Damaged Retinas” was an attempt to show how having damaged retinas has affect my vision. Permanently damaged by an unknown eye disease in the late 80’s and further damaged by a rare eye disease, “presumed ocular histoplasmosis syndrome” (POHS), 20 years later. This has caused a number of “Histo” spots to form on my retinas, and in 2013 an abnormal blood vessel erupted from one of them, resulting in me losing some of the vision in my left eye. The damage means that my vision is always blurred, which unlike myopia cannot be corrected with glasses. This meant that at an early age, cataracts had formed and I needed to have cataract surgery at the age of 51.

I also have frequent attacks of ocular migraines. It was walking to work during one of these attacks that I got the idea to start the project about my vision. I wondered how I could show these problems with my photography.

I discussed how I created each image by taking two images and then combining them to make a single image. One half was how “normal” sighted people see and the other half was what I see. I described how I took each image, first taking my view by setting the lens to manual and a distance of 5 meters, then retaking “normal” sighted view using autofocus as I am unable to manually focus a camera accurately. Then I combined both halves in photoshop and ensured that the vertical alignment never matched.

I further explained the how I produced the mounted prints used for the submission to the RPS. By creating a template in photoshop, so that each image could be printed on A3 paper and separated by 2 centimeters because the mount cutouts could only be professionally produced with a 2 cm separation.

I gained my Associateship in 2021 with this project.

It was during 2020/2021, I was dealing with another chronic illness (polyneuropathy) and the sickness process with my ex-employer and the Dutch employment services. My mental health suffered as result. Getting help via a mental health course, gained me the ability to understand how my thoughts can affect my physical symptoms and vice-visa. By focusing on goals, one of which was to be more creative, I again began to wonder if could use my photography skills to show my illness.

Using a series of self-portraits, I started a new project “I am not invisible, but my illness is”, which is outside of my comfort zone, as I don’t like being front of the camera. I started it to help my mental health and it has now become a kind of self-help therapy.

I have suffered from a neuromuscular condition since 2016 but it took until 2019 before I got the diagnose of Small Fiber Neuropathy (SFN). The small nerves in my body misfire, resulting in me experiencing pain and numbness when there is no external cause. This can be in the feet, legs and/or hands. It can also lead to abdominal problems.

This is an invisible illness, just like my eye condition from my previous project, you don’t see these illnesses. To others I look healthy, people don’t see what lies beneath.

I explained how I create my images via the two methods; in-camera and using photoshop. My work process is to use a tripod, taking two images. I take the first image where in one I am in front of the camera, using a remote to set off the timer on the camera, so that I have time to hide the remote. I repeat the same shot with me behind the camera, creating an in-camera multiple exposure, saving the individual images to give me the possibility of using photoshop to create a new and different multiple exposure image. With photoshop I can control the level of my transparency of the final image, whereas with in-camara method, I need to take more than 2 images.

I explained that my illness will always be part of me as the only treatment option on offer is symptom management and it is invisible to others. I use my photography skills to create the metaphor that the less you see of me the more I am consumed by illness. I liken my body to that of a rechargeable battery that is incapable of fully recharging, always running on reduced energy, with SFN stealing at least of 30% of it.

As I mentioned before I started this project as aid to my mental health, not with the intention of it being a RPS fellowship panel. But it slowly developed into a potential fellowship. I don’t knowwhether it will reach the technical requirement of the RPS fellowship, but I am getting help from the unofficial fellowship P2P group and the Benelux Chapter study group.

Although it would be nice to obtain an RPS fellowship sometime in the future, if it does not, it will still be a successful project because my overall goal is to boost my mental health and it has already helped with that.

I enjoyed giving the talk to the members of the ViewFinders club and got good feedback and encouragement to continue with my current project.

All photographs copyright of Katherine Maguire ARPS.

See my website for more of my work.