Images and text by Karine Leval

I’ve been in confinement in my home in Brooklyn since March 5th. While it’s unusual for me to stay in one place for so long (I love to travel and I’m otherwise often on the road for work or personal trips), this sudden pause has made me appreciate time, space and the ordinary in new ways.

I feel fortunate to have a terrace overlooking a small garden, where I’m spending time whenever the weather permits. I’ve never had the opportunity to see spring unfold the way it did this year. Flowers and bushes came to life in slow motion and I’ve watched nature follow its course while our lives are on hold. There is an incredible variety of birds chirping and singing different melodies, which I hadn’t noticed as intensely as I’ve noticed this spring, certainly because the roar of the city has fanned away.

Sometimes I feel I’m transported into a tropical island or a rain forest… When I’m not in a contemplative mode meditating on the power and beauty of nature and other daily routines don’t distract me, I’m editing my forthcoming Steidl book, focused on the series Heterotopia, as well as preparing for a large-scale installation in a new skyscraper in London. I’ve also been working virtually with composer/musician Aaron Kruziki for an LP project started 4 years ago, inspired by Heterotopia.

During this introspective time, it occurred to me that Heterotopia, and my work in general, has some connection with what we’re experiencing at the moment, being constrained into the limited realm of our homes. Although I usually get inspiration from the wider world and I’m away from my home while I work on a project, I often focus on contained and delineated spaces such as swimming pools or small areas in a garden, which I transform into fantastical larger-than-life landscapes that exist only beyond our perception and in the images I create.

This challenging experience has inspired me to see my own garden in a different way and to use it as a plein air studio. So I started a new series while stuck at home. For the time being, our only escape and way to cope with a feeling of imprisonment and anxiety might be to use the power of our imagination to push back the limits of our own confinement.

To see more of Karine’s work, check it out here.