These photos are from my summer working in Maine. Just a handful of the only 36 photos I shot while I was out there. All double exposures, I started with nature and ended with portraits. The nature was shot during training week before he kids arrived, and then my camera sat around for two months while I was teaching. Then in the final week of camp, I scrambled to take photos of friends and spent my last night off working in the darkroom. It all felt very chaotic and separated at the time, but looking back it feels poetic.
When I started editing these photos it immediately felt wrong. Covering scratches and dust felt like I was forcing a clean appearance, when in reality everything at camp was dusty and moldy, mice were in the cabins, skunks loitering outside… so I’ll embrace the imperfections. A few big scratches are covered if I’m honest. But, this film traveled with me through the 30-hour, 13-state, 10-day drive from Maine to Kansas and I honestly don’t remember a lot of that drive back. I was so depleted of any energy or desire to go back home, when it really felt like I was being evicted from my moldy, animal infested, safe, secluded, oasis of a 400-acre farm in coastal Maine.
2024
Madeline Schneider 