Fiona Rakimov, '(Not) Lost Boy no.3'
33.3 x 23 x 3 cm
Hand Printed. Ilford MG IV RC D
Edition 1/3 + 2AP + NFS
These portraits are from a series entitled ‘(Not) Lost Boy’ where Fiona photographs her son in various states of domestic adventure. These capture his much longed for dream life of living much further away than 9km from the city. He seeks out all sorts of urban adventures for himself, creating an almost imaginary existence like a weed between the crack of a concrete driveway…diving in skip bins instead of creeks and finding beauty in everyday verge trees, flies, crickets & pigeons. He is photographed in moments where he is both caught in play and interrupted.
Fiona Rakimov is Boorloo based and works across film, digital and alternative process photography. Having first learnt the art of dark room photography in high school, Fiona completed a BA Arts Design Photography Hons at Curtin in 2005. Throughout a career in the Arts with small and large scale International Arts Festivals on both east and west coasts of Australia, her personal photographic practice remains a constant. She is now in secondary education where she is teaching across digital, film/darkroom and alternative process photography to the next generation.
Fiona categorises her work loosely as ‘fictionalised portraits’ where she photographs whoever is closest and is spontaneously inspired by domestic or ordinary objects and locations. These become the fertile ground for imagined realities where characters are constructed from equal parts fact and fiction. Armed with an imagination that has definitely not faded with age, there is a perpetual blending of photographic genres and formats. From documentary, fashion to vernacular and more. Cameras are inherited, toy or second hand and no frills. Her work is created amidst the daily chaos of life as opposed to separate from. Photography is an every-day process based form of self-expression that brings continual joy, satisfaction, frustration and wonder.
It has been too long since Fiona has exhibited and it has become a renewed focus to share her photographic works.