Hymns from the Bedroom is the latest photo collection from London photographer Poem Baker. The series currently has three partsBaker calls them chapterscovering a period from 2010 to 2015. Baker describes the collection as a personal journal of friends and people [shes] encountered whilst wandering around London. Poems subjects are twenty-somethings on the threshold of their dreams and ambitions. Because she draws from her own group of friends and acquaintances, many are currently or aspiring to be in creative fields like acting, dance, music and fashion.
The collection of black and white photos is intensely intimate, and Poems subjects range from strippers to transvestites and others she describes as the fringe of societies. The raw black and white pictures deal frankly with issues like drug use, transgenderism, body image, family and relationships. Its a complex set of images, and there are no titles or captions, so the viewer is left to draw his or her own conclusions and stories based on theses momentary glimpse in the subjects lives. Because of Poems relationship with the subjects, were drawn into their vulnerabilities, fears, and desires.
By Anushila Shaw