On February 28th and May 15th, 2025, the core RoL-team (Rahil, Jaz and myself, Avery) met with Willeke Duivekam, who will be the photographer on our team. In Spring 2026, Willeke will travel to all three research locations and photograph a subset of each project’s participants. Our goal is to use photographs as another medium through which to explore and represent intimacy and connection between participants — aspects that might be lost in written description. Willeke has experience with exactly this type of work, composing portraits that draw attention to the subtle details of her subjects’ everyday lives.
In February, we met for lunch to get acquainted with Willeke, her previous projects, and her approach to her practice. Jaz and I also introduced our individual projects, our hopes for fieldwork, and our current creative fixations (textiles and print, respectively).
We met again in May to brainstorm potential themes and styles for this component of the project. We each brought examples of photos and spreads that inspire us, and explained what exactly we like about them. Willeke taught us to think about the components of content, form and presentation when imagining how approach a particular subject. We also learned to play with sameness and difference as a way to highlight particular details; for example, the same coffee cups every morning might be placed carefully, or less so; abandoned with varying amounts of coffee left un-drunk. These slight changes across a narrow focus stir in our imaginations the rhythms within our seemingly consistent, same-old, everyday.
When we meet again later this year, we will use insights from our first few months in the field to narrow down our creative approach, and prepare more concretely for the shoots in Spring.
You can explore more of Willeke’s work here.
Rhythms of Love 