I photographed more than 100 women over the course of one year in the movie theaters in Vienna. The inspiration originally emerged from Hollywood’s silent film era, where plenty of female directors, screenwriters and producers ruled the cinema scene, in a medium traditionally dominated by men. I was interested in the female gaze in the moving picture with no sound, depicting the complex but unique relationship between women. Both photography and silent film highlights the idea that gesture, body language and face expression can tell a story without a dialogue; women come in and out of the light, they embrace one another; a unique experience at the crossroads of art and performance. They are portrayed intimately and delicately; with nudity as a symbol to signify primal emotion and reveal the vulnerable in the human. To bare oneself completely in front of another; to be naked is to be without disguise. This is a pursuit to visualize the female body free of stigma and taboo; to reclaim, and the audience to gaze with identification rather than possession, in the darkness of the cinema.
