This is a photograph of Daryl Hembrough, Bristol comedian and model. Daryl was born with Pfeiffer Syndrome - a condition where the plates of the skull are fused together from birth. He spend his childhood and teenage years almost exclusively in hospital under-going more than 140 surgical interventions before he reached adulthood. This photograph is from a series of studio portraits of him that he and I are working on. It is a reflection on Daryl’s experience of himself over many years as it was to a large extend defined by what was being done to his body in order to help him survive.
People are at the centre of my photographic enquiry: their vulnerabilities, uniqueness, complex emotional worlds and the physical manifestations of their minds and souls. In my photographs I attempts to capture that elusive combination of personality and psyche, ratio and emotion, sensuous experience and physical expression of identity that we all possess, but rarely reveal. My work has been shown worldwide in Paducah Kentucky, USA, Miami, Cincinnati, New York City and San Francisco as well as in Berlin, Tokyo and Bristol and Bath in the UK.
