Ririn and the pet fish - Limited Edition of 10 Print

This picture is part of a series of photos from my documentary project "Velvet butterflies" on Indonesian transgender people, called Waria. This name comes from the merging of two words “wanita” (woman) and “pria” (man). These people are born male but, while growing up, they feel to have a female soul. I've been documenting their identity for 6 years in Jakarta. I've been fascinated by the extraordinary identity switch they have gone through. It is some kind of transformation like that of caterpillars becoming butterflies: deep, total, irreversible. For this reason, caterpillars/butterflies can stand as metaphor for transgender people: same person but different identities, through life. This portrait series aims to go beyond cultural and geographical differences of transgender people but, on the contrary, aims to investigate the inner process of transformation to fulfill one’s identity. Reflecting upon what a “metamorphosis” is, I have tried to work on the concept of “fake” and the duality between “ourselves and the image of ourselves given back by the looking-glass”, getting inspiration from painters such as Magritte, Bacon and the book of Lewis Carroll “Alice's Adventures in Wonderland”. The print is a fine art print on Handle FB 350 paper, in limited edition. The print is a 30x45cm (11,8x17,7in) picture with a white border of 0,5cm, ready to be framed. Other print sizes are possible upon request.