Photo Journal Monday: Cameron Ugbodu
All text and images by: Cameron Ugbodu
I began my journey with photography in Austria. Growing up in Mautern, a small town in Austria being born to Nigerian and Austrian parents, I always felt misplaced, confused, and unsure about my identity. Mixed with a general urge to go "out there", to explore the world that surrounds me and find out more about myself photography was the one art form that allowed me to do precisely that and many other things. Since then, it became my most popular tool to express myself and explore/document the world I observe, look forward to, or fear.
I was often working with symbolism and characters to put together storytelling. Apart from using other people as subjects to create their own story, I often used others to tell my own stories. Using the camera as a shield between myself and the subject allowed me to keep a physical and mental distance between me and the image/emotion in front of the lens. A few months ago, I started breaking up this security and exposing myself to discomfort by intentionally creating an ongoing self-portrait series. This in itself is nothing new, but in the past, I would always keep them to myself using the act of taking self-portraits solely as a meditative task not intended to be shared with the world. Some of the things I explored with the self-portrait series so far are my Nigerian/African identity, sexuality, my body, and my religious upbringing.
