A fresh testament of youth
Carolyn Mendelsohn’s latest exhibition explores the move from childhood to young adulthood. Yvette Huddleston talks to the award-winning photographer.
Six years ago, award-winning Bradford-based photographer and filmmaker Carolyn Mendelsohn embarked on a project exploring the complex transitional period between childhood and young adulthood. The result is a series of powerful, poignant portrait photographs of girls aged between 10 and 12, now on display in the new online exhibition Being Inbetween at the Impressions Gallery in Bradford. Mendelsohn explains that she was prompted to begin her exploration of this pivotal developmental stage after reflecting on her own experiences of being that age. “I was thinking about just how much that period had informed the adult I was to eventually become and I thought it would be really interesting to address this in my work,” she says.
“I had also noticed how much girls seemed to change at around that time – they would be these free-spirited kids who didn’t really care what anyone thought about them and then suddenly they would become more self-conscious and much less open; and that seemed to me to be quite significant.
“One of my strong feelings is that girls of that age are often seen as being at an awkward stage but I think it is actually quite an amazing stage – there is an awful lot happening. So, I thought it would be really interesting to take portrait photographs of girls that age celebrating who they are, and to ask them questions about their lives. I wanted