x. lens: ( the self as image )

self-portraits
(2023-2024)

nov twenty-five, twenty-twenty-three,
day after day it’s the same thing. i end up lying here staring at the ceiling way longer than i should, like i’m waiting for something to change but it never does. my phone is just there so i pick it up and scroll without really taking anything in, just killing time until i can’t justify staying in bed anymore.

living in this small apartment makes everything feel a bit too still. it’s not even loud loneliness, it’s very quiet.

the kind that sits in the corners of the room and follows you around without saying much.

the same walls,
the same light,
the same corners.

it starts to feel like the space is repeating me back to myself.

i eventually get up, but nothing really shifts. i’m tired in a way sleep doesn’t fix, bored in a way that isn’t really about things to do. it’s more like i’m stuck in a loop of the same hours, the same thoughts, the same nothing. and still...... i stay here, moving through it, trying to make something feel different even when it doesn’t.

love,
j.

( the space as witness, the space as portrait )

sept twenty-one, twenty-twenty-three,
i’ve been smoking in the studio again, even though my landlord gave me that whole speech about how the smell “settles into the walls over time,” like it’s some kind of emotional support ghost.

he’s not wrong though. the place definitely has opinions now, and they mostly smell like cigarettes and poor life choices.

my throat’s been sour all day, like it’s filing a complaint i’m actively ignoring.

i’ll light another one anyway, because apparently i believe in consistency if nothing else.

non-smokers always say stale smoke smells like dead bodies, which is a wild thing to just casually agree on as a society. i used to think that was dramatic. now i just think… maybe they’re not wrong, just specific. it doesn’t smell like death exactly, more like something that overstayed its lease and never learned how to leave properly.

anyway, the studio probably hates me. if it does, it’s too late...we’ve already cohabited.

love,
j.

may twenty-two, twenty-twenty-four,
summer’s started, and the flowers in my neighbor’s yard are fully showing off now. i found one that looks like feathered wings, these little white clusters that kind of sit there like a cherub.

it’s almost annoying how pretty it is. like it’s not even trying, just existing in full aesthetic confidence while i’m over here overthinking everything.

i’ve been thinking about portraits lately too..how to make them feel that effortless, that “it just is” kind of cool. and i keep circling back to the idea that maybe not everything needs to be decoded or loaded with meaning. some things are just meant to be looked at for a second too long, then left alone.

like that flower. it’s not saying anything.
which honestly feels like the point.

lovelovelove, j.

( the body as sculpture )
july thirty-one, twenty-twenty-four,
i was looking at this image called “marble statue of the so-called stephanos athlete” and just kind of stuck on how perfect the figure looks, like it exists in a completely different category of human.

for a second i even thought, half joking, maybe i should just strip down and see how close i could get to that kind of pose or proportion.

then reality immediately tapped me on the shoulder.

bodies aren’t really built like marble statues. not in the same way, not with the same symmetry or permanence. some are just… different. i’m probably just on the leaner side, not exactly “carved by ancient gods” material, more like “economy edition anatomy.”

but honestly, who fucking cares. not everything has to be sculpted to be seen, and not every body has to be a monument. there’s something a bit ridiculous about treating skin like it needs to earn its right to exist in the open.

so yeah, maybe i’m not marble. most people aren’t. and that’s fine.

i feel sick,
j.

sept seventeen, twenty-twenty-three,
woke up today and,
for no real reason other than i had the time and the silence, i picked up my camera and started staging a scene.

there’s this idea i’ve been circling in my head for a while....

something like a lone wolf placed in a wilderness that doesn’t really care if he’s there or not. no clear reason to keep going except the fact that he already is.

in that space, he has this one thing:

a plant.

something stubborn. something he decides to take responsibility for.

but the problem is the environment doesn’t cooperate. there’s no real support for it, no water that comes when it should, no guarantee it was ever going to survive in the first place. it’s almost like a setup for failure. and still, he keeps tending to it, because that’s what you do when you’re alone, you attach meaning to the only thing that responds to your presence.

and i guess the more i sit with it, the less it feels like a story about survival and the more it feels like a mirror. like the plant and the wolf aren’t separate roles, just two versions of the same thing...one trying to grow, the other trying to justify the growing. both dependent on a world that doesn’t really adjust itself for either of them.

eventually,
of course, it breaks down. not in a dramatic way, more like a slow agreement.

the plant wilts first, but not alone.
the wolf follows, not because it chooses to,
but because there was never really a separation between caring for something and being shaped by its decline.

and I don’t know.....maybe that’s the part that stays with me, the idea that what we try to sustain outside of us is often just a quieter version of what we’re trying to keep alive inside.

wake me up,
j.