Even before the pandemic, I struggled with feelings of isolation. I go through bouts of depression and needed to make something that reflected that. So, using rocks from my rock garden, I built a plinth in the middle of my makeshift home studio. I scattered flour over the floor and it turned the space into a desolate hinterland – like the surface of the moon, another world for the viewer to step into. I set up the camera, took my position, placed the goldfish bowl over my head like a space helmet, and hit the self-timer.
When I saw the image, it felt like a direct reflection of my emotions. It looked like a marriage of two passions of mine: Afrofuturism, a cultural movement blending science-fiction, fantasy and history to explore the Black experience, and butoh, a Japanese avant-garde dance of the dead in which performers often wear thick white face and body paint. The contrasting materials – the coldness of glass, the ashen quality of the flour, the warmth of human skin – made the image texturally rich, giving it a depth that felt like another universe.
