I became fascinated by the synergy of people within the built environment, how the abundance or lack of space effects a person psyche, making them feel claustrophobic or agoraphobic in the extreme.

My project sets out to explore the ubiquitous links between the human psyche, the built environment and the spaces we occupy. Through the medium of photography this project will illustrate individuals, responses to their unique experiences or emotional reactions to the environment they occupy. This project is an exploration of personal space and what that means to us.

I have started by looking at what makes up my space, the home and objects that are personal to me. This journey starts with the house, as the philosopher Gaston Bachelard says in his book Poetics of space:

“Of course, thanks to the house, a great many of our memories are housed, and if the house is a bit elaborate, if it has a cellar and garret, nooks and corridors, our memories have refuges that are all the more clearly delineated.”¹

Through a series of interviews and questionnaires I will be working with people from differing backgrounds to establish what their ‘space’ means to them. Combining portraits with images of place, I aim to create a body of work that illustrates the impact of space on the human psyche.

[¹ The poetics of space, Gaston Bachelard, Penguin books 2014 page 30 ‘The House’]