Mikayla Damon
Mikayla at East End Beach (1), collaborative portrait
A black and white portrait shows a person standing in the ocean at waist-length, partially covered in wet seaweed under bright sunlight. Wearing a dark mesh shirt, they stand in front of the lens with their eyes looking upward. Strands of wet seaweed drape across their face and intertwine in their dark hair. Their right hand is squeezing the cable release, left hand positioned on their face, fingers bent.
Mikayla at East End Beach (2), collaborative portrait
A black and white portrait shows a person lying reclined back across a dense bed of dark, textured seaweed along the water's edge. Wearing a long-sleeved mesh garment, they rest with their eyes closed, head tilted back, and one hand gently resting against their face while the other extends outward over the tangled sea kelp, pressing the cable release.
When Is the Self, and Where?
I exist in a body that can cause me pain and injury. I live in a self that exists beyond the body. I live in the world and exist as part of it, I live in a mind that wonders upon what lays within the blurred edges of those relationships. Here you will see my lived experience of a body that faints, rejects food, places where I've experienced concussions, and places where the self slips beyond the body.
Artist Statement:
Mine: In the forest a hand is outstretched in front of a circle of placed birch trunks. It appears to be beckoning you.
Lichen: The abdomen of someone wearing a heathered gray tank top pulled up with stomach showing. They are wearing blueish black shorts with blue underwear. There is lichen where their bellybutton would be. Their nails are also bluesh gray matching the other tones in image. They are laying on the forest floor.
Reject: A pink bathroom with dust has a body laying collapsed over a toilet.
Hunger Pain: a nude tattooed body sitting in a chair slumped over a dining room table. There are plants covering the walls. Flash was used, causing the body to have a bit harsher lighting than the scene. Their ribs show and the chair hides parts of the body causing the body to have confusing length
Strawberry: a hand holds a small red strawberry still on the plant. The plant is on a planter on a porch. The outstretched hand has a strawberry tattoo running up the wrist. The hand has long almond shaped nails.
Wrapped Berry: An arm is in a bramble of Raspberries the red tones of the out of focus vines give a warm image with green and red stems.
Concussion 2: There is a stairway that shows a fallen nude body. The feet are entangled in the railing, the torso outstretched over the remaining stairs, while their head is outstretched on the floor near lines of shoes. This is a replication of their second concussion.
Concussion 3: the image shows a fallen nude body on the floor, shoes are around alluding to an entrance out of view. There is a window that is casting floral shadows next to the body. This is a replication of their third and most recent concussion
Invasive: A body is curled amidst an large invasive rose bush. There are colors displayed on the images, in the center the haze is green with blueissh purple borders.
Blue Vervain: A hand is wrapped around blue vervain growing in a garden. The camera is focused on the specific flower bunch that is grasped in the hand, the garden and yard are faded and soft. The flower bunch has spikes with purple flowers growing in a ring.
**See bottom of page for additional botanical information
Blue Summer: A hand over the ocean. The hand has long almond shaped nails with mother of pearl nails alternating with purple sparkly nails, the fingers are slightly curled. The ocean is a very deep blue
Mimicry: On the forest floor there is an s shaped stick, as its out of focus it may resemble a snake, an arm outstretched is mimicking this movement.
Vined: Legs standing on the forest floor as a vine entangles them
Chloros: A nude body is squatting and holding queen anne's lace, flower to root, across their eyes. They are in front of the roots of a fallen tree. At the periphery there are trees that have turned a glowing white green from the use of flash. The body is also a glowing color. The photo has a grainy texture
Above: The background is a boulder with a fallen tree. There are ferns growing on the boulder. There is a nude body seated with legs out outstretched hands cupping the top of the face showing the eyes that are looking up. The image is grainy and textured with a slight blue haze and over ferns there is a green haze.
Queen Anne’s Lace: A nude body stands adorned with a black velvet full length opera coat and long strands of pears. The body is holding a whole queens annes lace plant with roots pointing to the sky, the head is slightly looking back with eyes rolled back. The other hand is holding a fern frond over their pubic region. The foreground is ferns with a fallen tree roots in the background.
Dyrad: Taking place in the same setting as Above. This nude body is now lying across the rocks; a leg in movement appears to blur into the background. Ferns cover sexual characteristics, leaving gender ambiguous. Is this a body or something part of the environment?
The Feet of a Marian Apparition: White shiny cloth drapes bare legs and feet are planted in the ferns. Above the knees, lighting is taking over the image with a warm diagonal haze.
Additional botanical information:
** Blue vervain/Verbena hastata features flower bunches or as they are botancally known, panicals. These are spiked bunches have many densely packed flowers that do not open all at once. Thus it will look like a bunch of spikes with each spike having a ring of flowers, with the other flowers already past, or yet to bloom.