PARALLELS: AGEING, IDENTITY AND THE LANDSCAPE

This photographic series explores the intersection of ageing, identity and the environment through black and white images. Presented in non-linear pairs, each set of photographs draws visual and emotional parallels between the ageing female body and weathered landscapes, revealing a quiet resilience and beauty often overlooked.

Ageing has fascinated humanity for millennia, from Aristotle’s belief that it caused intellectual decline, to pre-industrial reverence for elders. With the advent of the Industrial revolution altering the way people lived and worked, this respect shifted due to longer working hours and time restraints, and the elderly were seen as a burden. In today’s society, older individuals, particularly women, are often rendered invisible. While men may be seen to become distinguished with age, women, by contrast, are often viewed as feeble. This imbalance persists despite the progress of feminism. Wrinkles, grey hair and other natural markers of time are too often framed as signs of decline rather than of survival, wisdom, and grace.

Through these images, I aim to challenge the narrative of ageism. Photographing these women has deepened my awareness of how undervalued and under-represented older women are in visual culture. Their presence within these images reclaims visibility and honours the strength found in ageing.

Time shapes us as it shapes the land - gently, powerfully and inevitably. In acknowledging the natural process of ageing, we can begin to find beauty not only in change but in endurance. These photographs invite viewers to look again, to see ageing not as loss, but as a landscape of lived experience.