Carola Dreidemie

My images are an investigation into our social and cultural forms of adaptation, transformation, identification, reinvention and resistance. This work is about Power and Discourse. This work attempts to discover and expose the elements and symbols, we chose to display on our bodies to provide evidence of a true marginality. This is particularly interesting to notice within an imperial context in which our difference acts to our disadvantage. These elements are important symbols in multiple ways.

Other Portraits:

Vestigios. Drag Kings Patricia y Marcela,

Buenos Aires, Argentina 2005 24x36 inches

Digital prints and 18x22 Silver gelatin prints.

Third, these elements change, merge and transform while keeping their character of differentiation and resistance intact.

This work is also about love. The subjects that I photograph are primarily close to my heart and my life. I am attracted to study the poses of my friends as they face the camera.

Series: All Eyez on US (2004) Silver Gelatin Prints. Published by En Foco in the journal Nueva Luz.

(2003) In my photographic research I use the portrait form to inquire into issues of cultural and political marginality. I scrutinize our difference theoretically and literally. My most important influences are Richard Throssel (Crow Indian) James Van der Zee, and Catherine Oppie: all of them photographed their ‘tribes’ in a similar way.

All Eyez on Us images are shot using a 4x5 view camera on Kodak T-max 400 film. Printed in a chemical darkroom to a 19x22 inch size print and selenium toned.

I record the position of their hands, their stance and in doing so I think that sometimes I get a glimpse into their fluid world of dreams, frustrations, passions and loss.

First, they act as elements of resistance to a cultural homogenizing domination and silence.

Second, they act as elements of identification within the group itself. In this character they are imbedded with feelings of pride, belonging and love.