Emotional Colors

Blue. Green. Yellow. Orange. Purple. Pink. Gray.

Contentment. Grounded. Internalized. Forgiveness. Justification. Confusion. Shame.

Colors often evoke feelings. Without even knowing it, we can have certain emotions tied to specific colors. A few years ago I had a conversation with a friend of mine about color. She has synesthesia. Synesthesia is when something that is meant to only stimulate one part of your brain stimulates several. In her case, when she listens to music she sees colors in her head. She's an artist so she has often painted songs. One day, I had asked her to paint a song for me and I got to be with her while she did it. Eventually, I started asking questions about the colors and if they meant certain things pertaining to the song. She then started articulating how each of the colors fit into the story of the song or the sound of it. It was the most fascinating conversation. At the time she had never thought about the reason for the colors. She hadn't realized how a color evoked a specific emotion in her. I ended up asking about every color and writing down how she felt about each one. She talked about how some were very specific like gray was shame. Red on the other hand was often one that was there to show the depth of another. It was often strong feelings of either love or anger. She also sees peoples' personalities as colors if she knows them well enough. I had a fun time asking the color of some of our friends and why they might be that color. All in all, it is still one of my favorite conversations I've ever had to this day.

Right around the time we had the conversation I had really started to get into photography. I had seen an amazing photography series done by where men were photographed crying. She wanted to beak the stigmatism that men can't cry and I thought it was absolutely amazing. It planted the seed in me to do a photography series. Eventually I came up with the idea to style shoots to convey how colors felt based on the emotional description of each that Jessica had given me. So over the past 3 years I've been working to create a 6 part series of some of the colors.

Light blue - having what you want, bliss, contentment

The very first one we did was light blue. Some colors change meaning depending on the depth of that color. Dark blue is more about striving, longing, and showing the depth of something. Light blue is contentment and peace. Being happy where you are. So I decide to get balloons, steamers, and flowers. A celebration of the contentment with the now. A form of happiness with where one was. This one was done back in May of 2018. At the time I had only had my camera for about 5 months. We put up the blue sheets in my room. I bought the props from Dollar Tree. It has a bit of a hot mess, but we loved how they turned out. Now years later as I post them I see how they could be better. How my photography is better. Part of me wanted to reshoot it, but in that moment we were embodying light blue. We were so content and happy with what we created. So I didn't reshoot them to honor what we did then, who we were, and what we created.

Green- awareness, grounded, nature, world, growth

The next color we shot was green. The words that Jessica used to describe green obviously shows why we decided to shoot outside. Another cool factor is that Jessica sees her personality as green. So we truly had as much green as possible in the photos. We shot these in her yard. Again, it was so minimalistic, a bit of a hot mess, but we thought they were so great. I remember this was one of the first times I struggled with how to edit. Working to figure out what colors I did or din't want accentuated in the photos. This whole series is a reminder to me of how my photography has grown over the years.

Mustard yellow- internalized, inner thoughts/struggles, holding things in

Mustard yellow is really about our inner thoughts. That turmoil. Obviously that's a really hard thing to show outwardly, but I had the idea of writing the thoughts on the body. A small glimpse into the window of the soul. I wanted to write the things that the person struggled with. The thoughts that swirled in their head. Y'all. Ozi was beyond amazing for doing this shoot with me. We hadn't been friends long when I did this shoot with him. We had, had deep conversations, but asking someone to tell me their inner thoughts/struggles and letting me write them on their body is definitely next level.

Orange- a step towards forgiveness, knowing that you need to forgive, but you’re still angry

Purple- impulsive, justification, opposite of what you believe

When I first thought about shooting purple I had not envisioned doing it with orange. I can't remember how I got onto the path of what we ended up doing, but I love it. The story we were telling for these colors is that the guy cheated on his girlfriend and really didn't feel a lot of remorse. He was just justifying his actions. The girlfriend is in the process of trying to forgive him, but it's obviously still hard. We shot these on a white sheets I had set up outside my garage door. Jayden was actually wearing dark blue and I had to edit it to purple. It was the most challenging shoot editing wise as I had to learn knew skills to get the photos I wanted. I was very happy with how them turned out because the two of them did such a good job of portraying the story I wanted to tell.

Pink- confusion, not knowing

Cloud of confusion. That was the idea that first popped into my head for this. I knew I wanted to use pink smoke and have a male model. This was my very last shoot of the series and it really turned out exactly how I envisioned it. This shoot was something. I had group of friends with me cause I needed someone to work the smoke and we were all gonna hangout after. It was definitely chaotic, full of laughter, screeching, and banter. I didn't know the smoke was going to shoot sparks so I accidentally ended up burning holes in Carter's shirt. The smoke also burned our eyes so poor Carter really did suffer for this art. I felt so bad, but he was happy to help me achieve what I wanted. So outstanding model award goes to Carter.

Grey- Shame

Wrapped up in your shame. That was the little tag line I had in my head for this. I knew that I wanted the pictures to be black and white. I also knew I wanted tear marks on the face and it to be a very raw emotional shoot. Aly did not come to play games when did this shoot. She was so dedicated to helping portray what I want to portray. She brought eye drops to make the tear streak marks and even full on screamed for one of the shots. As we've talked about this shoot over time she's also shared about how she was dealing with a lot of shame at the time because she was dealing with infertility. She was feeling shame about the fact that her body wasn't doing what it was "supposed to do." I'm so grateful for her vulnerability in doing this shoot with me.

The fact that I am finally sharing this series with the world is crazy. I never would have dreamed it would taken so long to finish, but I'm so thankful it all happened when it did. God has showed me how sometimes I think I'm just taking pictures or telling my own story, but He's working behind the scenes telling His own story too. I'm so grateful for all the people who either modeled for a shoot or cheered me on behind the scenes. This series has been part of me learning I truly am a creative, artist, and photographer. It has captured my growth not only as a photographer, but as a person through the years.

I hope this series has made you think about what colors mean to you and maybe even inspired you in some way. Making, seeing, and sharing art is one of my favorite things in the world. It brings me such joy. I hope that whatever your creative ability is, you learn to grow in it and share it with the world. And here's a reminder that you ARE an artist. You ARE a creative. Us creatives loves to down play our talents. We too often compare ourselves to others and never feel like we're "talented" enough. But art isn't about being perfect or enough. It's about sharing. It's about creating something that we deem needs to be shared with the world. That could be something fun, sad, beautiful, grotesque, uplighting, depressing, simple, or complex. So go out there and make your art. Share you stories. Show the world the creativity God has given you. And know my heart is made full knowing my fellow creatives are putting their art into the world.