The body has left the building

The body has left the building is photo series about the realization that if emotions become too hard to handle, you need to get them out of your body.

In the title of the series, there is a reference to the idiom Elvis has left the building, which is still often used in American culture. This sentence was used at the end of his public shows, making the audience understand that enough is enough, it’s time to go home. At the time when this series was made, my body was tired of expectations, pandemic, didn’t have the opportunities to discharge. The body was in a “enough is enough” state. Visually, I wanted to make a contrast between this impersonal body seeking discharge and a romanticized environment symbolizing freedom.

The series began as a fascination with German photography collector Jochen Raiß’s work Women in Trees, a selection of black-and-white photographs of women from the first half of the last century posing in tree branches. Something about it seemed very, very beautiful and very, very simple. I imagined that the body could enjoy being responsible for simple functions such as climbing a tree.

Anete Aramina (1990) obtained a bachelor’s degree in economics, a master’s degree in sociology, learned the basics of photography from Raimo Lielbriedis, studied contemporary photography at the ISSP school, participated in various photo contests. With this series, she entered the final of the FK Prize for young Latvian photographers and the jury recognized it as one of the three best projects.