• 2022 Capstone
    • Omar Noah Gonzalez
    • Jade Luther
    • Eden Smith
    • Aaron Heinrich
    • Dawson Peters
    • Elliot Lovell
    • Christyana Fletcher
    • Alyson Disbrow
    • Omar Barrera
    • Sarah Tuttleman
    • Jack McMIllan
    • Leanne Brodie
    • Meghann Grace Peltz
    • Cameron Zucker
    • Kylie Brennan
    • Tesa Ahuna Turqueza
    • AJ Edelman
    • Sydney Fife
  • 2021 Capstone
    • Juana Apachito
    • Caleb Autry
    • Kylie Barela
    • Carlynn Begay
    • Timmy Deppe
    • Michael Gregersen
    • Charlotte Haston
    • Madeleine Howard
    • Alan Kammerman
    • Diana Ochs
    • Michael Patacsil
    • AnnaLycia Patrice
    • Marisa "MP" Pinette
    • Celia Reid
    • Maria Saldivar
    • Lindsay Tolstedt
    • Kayla Willis
    • Natalie Wiseman
    • Tyler Woodward
    • Yingni Wu
  • 2020 Capstone
    • Alastair Poll
    • Austin Sudweeks
    • Bess Valdez
    • Carynn Meyers
    • Cassidy Coles
    • Cecilia Polichetti
    • Claire Sipos
    • Courtney Jorgenson
    • David Williams
    • Emilio Ferrara
    • Grace Oresman
    • James Muraki
    • Jayna Powers
    • Jenni Summers
    • Katherine Perry
    • Katie Kroeppler
    • Marc Amaya
    • Margaret Whittaker Reniker
    • Maria Rene Marsh
    • Michaela Sullivan
    • Miles Rhoades
    • Nicole Babler
    • Savannah McKinzie
    • Savi Klasen
    • Shannon Cowan
    • Shannon Swain
    • Shelby Sorensen
    • Sierra Olson
    • Stephanie McLean
    • Tehlor Takahata

Madeleine Howard

The Unveiling

Photography has always been my safest form of self-expression, where I can create images and feel like they accurately represent my inner world; a place I often struggle to find the words to describe properly. I’ve always had difficulty in expressing myself, words never said what I wanted them to and they often felt empty. Photography has provided me with a way to describe what I am feeling by putting what I want to say into images rather than words.

 

Many of my previous works have covered the persistent bouts of depression I’ve dealt with and how it feels to be in the middle of one. I’ve done this by using cool tones, a faceless human figure, and a minimalistic style to represent the empty, out-of-body, vulnerable experience it can be. Much of my work has represented this one aspect of myself, not really expressing much of anything else. It is with this in mind that I wanted to branch out and embark on a new series of photographs: a series where each photo would represent a different emotion that I experience almost daily, yet have not been comfortable expressing outwardly. 

 

The coming of each new day brings a series of emotions that can come on quite rapidly, feel overwhelming in the moment, and then pass just as quickly as it showed up. All within a single day’s time, I could experience extreme sadness or anxiety, all the way to feeling like I’m on top of the world, or even feeling nothing at all. However, I’ve felt for a long time that I cannot voice these feelings out loud because it would make me even more “difficult” than my depressive episodes already made me. Feeling things internally and showing them to others are two different stories, the latter of which is not something that I’ve been comfortable with. 

 

This project is the first step in revealing the parts of myself I’ve kept hidden for years.

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Panic

I am convinced that my ribs serve

As a cage for the bees that inhabit my chest

Who swarm and sting over nothing in particular

Paralyzed.

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Empty

The thump of my heartbeat

Echoes throughout my body

Reminding me that I am alive and full

Physically, at least

But why, then, if I am full 

Of bones, of muscle, of organs, why

Does the pounding of my heart

Echo?

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Detached

I look at my hands

From far back inside my head

And they are not my own

They are attached to me, so they must be mine

But I do not recognize them as mine

Whose hands are these?

Whose body is this?

I’m in it, but it’s not me

It’s not mine.

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Shame

Shame, shame on me

“How could I? Why did I?”

Shame, it builds a comfortable home

Within the walls of my mind,

It’s construction, ear-splitting.

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Defective

Glitchy, pixelated, flawed

It’s just wrong

Something is wrong but I can’t name it directly

Something inside me,

Inherently wrong.

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Fury

Fires rise up inside my throat

Traveling from my lungs

Through my veins

Up my esophagus

The flames escape through my lips and fingertips

Singeing the skin of my body

And anyone unlucky enough to be so close.

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Somber

When my bones feel like lead

And the air feels constricting

All I can do is stay still

Stay very still

And hope the forces that hold my body down

Feel satisfied with the weight they’ve placed on me already

Please, no more.

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Invincible

Oh how sad it must be

To look in the mirror and see not what I see

For what looks back at me through that shiny surface

Looks at me, in earnest, believing itself to be

A God among Men

The look in it’s eyes strikes me again

It turns to me, a cocky smile shows it’s teeth

I feel my lips move, my voice utter

“Blessed be.”

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Lost

How did I end up here?

In the middle of nowhere, when I wanted to be somewhere by now,

But where is the nowhere I’m in? 

And how do I leave?

And how do I know which somewhere I want to go to 

Once I finally escape the nowhere?

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Consumed

The obsession starts

I’ll never want anything else, I’m sure

But soon there comes a day

Where my obsession stays

Collecting dust in the corners of my room

Never to be touched again, doomed.

NAU PHOTOGRAPHY CAPSTONE