Female Spiritual Healing with Vain VVitch
“I work with The Recycled Closet, Miami’s luxury consignment store, to style and send out what I call dybbuk boxes. The boxes contain film, clothes and good spirits. This is my way of sharing the confidence I harnessed behind the camera with women who might feel marginalised and unsure of the potential they have to be art directors.”
Creating female empowerment centred work through a post modern dybbuk utilising photography and performance Vain VVitch creates an accessible medium for women to create their own strong contemporary voice within the confines of art.
vain vvitch is a number of things and i can’t promise you a boiled down answer. perhaps vvv is a glorified excuse to play dress up with other artistically driven women in the area... in other ways, vvv is a move towards the mirror. being into yourself is not a crime, but it’s easy to get caught up in vanity and forget what joys come from girlhood without the jealousy and unrealistic expectations we might have for ourselves and one another.
vvv incentivizes a space where women can work together, wherever you need...
vvv is not all here, and it’s not all there.
vvv is a box...
a direct message may bring you closer to what's inside
Tell us more about yourself and your practice.
I am a 25-year-old woman from Miami, currently writing a Master’s thesis for a degree in Moving Image Studies. I am a photographer witch by day and a writer by night.
What was your creative process for this series or for your work in general?
My creative process is always centred and inspired by women, from the girl next door to the one across the country. I work with The Recycled Closet, Miami’s luxury consignment store, to style and send out what I call dybbuk boxes. The boxes contain film, clothes and good spirits. This is my way of sharing the confidence I harnessed behind the camera with women who might feel marginalised and unsure of the potential they have to be art directors.
What work inspires or has inspired you?
I’m so inspired by musicians, particularly polymath artists like Alison Mosshart from The Kills and Hether Fortune of Wax Idols.
Are there any artistic movements you enjoy in particular and why?
Surrealism is my go-to artistic movement for inspiration. I love the dark and mysterious, sometimes horrific qualities, emerging from Frida Kahlo to Dora Maar.
Do you have any opinions or ideals underlying your art?
Champion your fellow woman.
As a woman I feel immediately drawn and in love with your work. You’re sharing a really dark female-centric photographic gaze. Tell us more about the inside perspective or female gaze underlying your whole persona? Tell us more about your Vain VVitch persona.
I made Vain VVitch to salvage my vanity while I felt trapped in an abusive relationship. I was able to send out dybbuk boxes of my own spirit to women in Tennessee, California, Florida, and those boxes started working as anchors. When I emerged out of the relationship with trauma, I had a safety net in the movement I had created. I’ve never lost faith in how powerful girl love is and the dark female-centric photographic gaze does come from the light of that empowerment.
Any words for aspiring artists?
The biggest mistake a woman can make is to believe she’s working for a man.
Is there anything you’re currently working on?
I’m currently writing a book about Polish cinema and how it impacts public memory in regards to the Holocaust.
Follow her IG.