Deborah’s story
While this West Country photographer finds solace in nature, she also loves the order and control of studio work
Deborah Richards is another talented all-rounder who is as happy taking surreal landscapes or portraits as she is capturing finely detailed night scenes – indeed her stunning image of the moon behind Glastonbury Tor, taken four miles from the famous monument, graced The Times last year. ‘I’ve been a photographer since the early ’80s but hadn’t realised its therapeutic benefits until 2017, when I suffered an emotional crash which left me feeling alone and lost,’ Deborah explains. ‘I needed a reason to leave the house so I started wandering around with my Fujifilm X-T2. The more I focused on other things, the more I externalised my feelings rather than internalising them. This formed a bridge between my dissociative patterns and the world around me.’
Solace of the studio
While portraits had been Deborah’s first love in photography, when she returned to taking photos she was more guided by how she was feeling. ‘Some of my first images were of prisons and graveyards… deep, dark and poignant places. Recently I deleted a lot of these early images because they were reflections of the very dark place I was in.’
These days, Deborah finds that while she still suffers from feelings of detachment from the outside world and a fear of losing control, setting up a home studio has been very therapeutic. ‘It’s nice to be able to control what I am doing and how I am interacting with anybody or anything else. The studio lighting is such a complex area, you can make it as difficult or as simple as you want… you’re in control and there is so much you can do. It’s interesting and gives you something else to focus on. My studio is my retreat, an escape but also a therapeutic area. My models feel this when they go in.
Letting go of fears of failure has helped Deborah too. ‘You will miss shots and mess up, even in a very controlled studio situation, but you learn from your mistakes. You learn to accept disappointment and this is also good for your mental health – you know next time you’ll do better.’
Be realistic about social media Despite acknowledging the usefulnesss of social media for photographers, Deborah cautions against relying on it, or investing too much emotional energy.
‘Social media has its uses, but the artficiality of online apps and filters being used to edit portraits and other images beyond recognition, along with some of the trolling, cliqueiness and back-biting, can soon bring you down and outweigh the positive mental health benefits that photography brings.
‘I never compare my work to other images, or copy or compete against other photographers. This is my mindful, authentic approach, and it maintains my usefulness. I don’t wish to fight for attention on social media and trust the right attention will happen in a synchronistic way.’
Returning to her work, Deborah also cites the therapeutic effect of her image of Glastonbury Tor (left). ‘It was a mathematical process to line everything up and I shot from several miles away… lots of precision and planning. The exhilaration as the moon appeared and rolled up the hill, along with the realisation that I’d positioned myself correctly to the nearest metre, gave me a huge sense of achievement. But again, I also enjoy learning from mistakes that I make during photography, and this mindset helps in other parts of my life, too.’