ELLEN WILLIAMS

Writing a statement about the idea behind your work is like the parlour game where you have to describe something without using any of its associated terms: How to explain something without, well, explaining it? If an image is worth a thousand words, those words must be over-used to the point of exhaustion - and the word intimacy is the one we must skirt around here. Like brand-new when we mean re-hashed, love when we mean like, or normal when we mean boring, intimacy is a word that is thrown around so often that its sparkle has chipped away. A good way to start describing intimacy would be by talking about sleep. Sleeping un-alone is incredibly intimate in a soft way nothing else is. Whether you are curled asleep next to your lover or crammed in a bed with your best friend, falling asleep next to someone else is something special. Cold toes on a warm calf. An arm curled around a waist. A curl of hair that belongs to someone else tickling your neck. Photography is intimate; how could it not be? To combine the two must be doubly so. Imagine three friends in a double bed in the early morning haze of just awakening. While one was still asleep, the second took pictures of the third. The results of this are shown in my exhibition.