“The End of Escapism”

This image was created during the 2017 PDX Squared Photography Competition, a 24-hour creative challenge across Portland. It was later featured in the Pro Photo Supply Large Format Gallery Show.

Shot inside a local store filled with vintage relics and forgotten pieces, the portrait came together in just a few quiet moments. The woman pictured had been working behind the counter that day. We talked briefly, and she agreed to step into the scene. There’s a tension in the image, the kind that only shows up when something is already unraveling.

There are so many ways we learn to escape — through beauty, through chaos, through the things we hold just tightly enough to forget ourselves for a while. This image lingers at the edge of that pattern. It marks the moment when those distractions begin to lose their grip. When the need to let go outweighs the need to hold on.