Tuning in again from Tybee, Island in Savannah, Georgia with another documentary series from my time here. I worked with Dagmwait’s parents at the local health food store so she would often come in and visit. We bonded over our mutual love over pink, sparkles and other girl stuff. She loved to be photographed, and I loved to photograph her. Together, we documented an era of her childhood and girlhood in a pre pre-teen era.
Sweet and from the heart, this is Dagmawit.
I’m writing this from my husband Max’s dad’s man cave that is lovingly referred to as “The Tree House” on Tybee Island in Savannah, Georgia.
Savannah is where Max and I met working at the local health food store, and fell in love on the vitamin isle, in the spanish moss covered streets, the alligator littered swamps and beer soaked punk shows.
I went to school at Savannah College of Art and Design from 2011-2015 and got my Bachelor of Fine Arts in Photography, before going on to get my Master of Fine Arts in Experimental and Documentary Arts at Duke.
In 2010 I drove my lil’ butt down to Savannah from Charlotte, North Carolina my senior year of High School and auditioned for the Performing Arts department with a jazzy dance solo I had choreographed for myself, a Roxie monologue from Chicago the Musical, and sang Ella Fitzgerald. I got in.
Freshman year I was dating a dude who was controlling and an evangelical christian. He told me that “acting wasn’t serving god” and that I if I didn’t change my major wouldn’t have a future together. I was also processing a lot of shame, multiple grapes, budding auto immune conditions, and deep self hate.
I was also being told by teachers, mentors and the industry that I didn’t have the “right” body type to be a dancer, an actor, or performer in general, and unless I was going to lose 10 pounds (repeatedly) it just wouldn’t “happen” for me.
This was not the first time this feedback had been offered to me. I was tired of hearing it.
So here’s the girl math…
controlling evangelical christian boyfriend + toxic performing arts industry + exhaustion + complex trauma = I dropped my performing arts major before sophomore year and changed it to photography.
I had helped build the darkroom in my high school, had been using my moms film camera since 12, and was always the girl at the parties with her camera, uploading facebook folders the next day.
Little did I know photography was going to be a portal into intimacy with strangers. Some of whom would become dear friends and a mirror into myself.
Photography also taught me how to hold a fierce space for folks to come alive in their fullness.
I’m not the kind of photographer whose ever going to tell you to “smile.”
I am a talker. A question asker. A listener. A reflector. And an instigator. I love inviting people to a place within themselves where they feel like they can let their soul shine through their skin.
Diana Rogers was one of the first folks I ever did a “documentary series” with. She was my customer at the health food store and we would often bond over her fabulous lewks, red nails, love for herbal medicine and the performing arts.
She was a well known singer and performer at historic piano bars and restaurants in Savannah, Georgia and had a rich history of performing all over the country.
I would walk over to her victorian mansion after class, we would sip jalapeño martinis, and she would tell me stories about her life, while showing me closets of vintage clothes and costumes from her journey.
We became dear friends.
Diana passed on my birthday this year. She was a witch, too, so I know she’s working her magick in the quantum. I like to think of her as my Showgirl Guide. I feel like she has been present with me this year as I have gone from a 7 year performance hiatus into hitting the stage close to 40 times by the end of this year.
Thank you Diana, for being my doula and guide into documentary and portrait photography. This will forever be one of my favorite series, and felt like the right photo story to start blogging with again for the first time in many years.
This series is called 310 East Gaston (the address of Diana’s Savannah victorian mansion) and was nominated for a Lucie Award as a part of the International Photography Awards in 2014.
This work was exhibited at a gallery in New York and I got to go to a fancy award ceremony at Carnegie Hall. I got second place in the portrait category, and was a finalist in the deeper perspective documentary category. I was 21. I also got to meet one of my documentary photography mothers and idols Nan Goldin who told me I had a great tits. Thanks Nan.
Bowing in gratitude to the lineage of badass witches & bitches who came before me,
Sarah
