© National Portrait Gallery 2025
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Canberra, ACT 2600, Australia
Phone +61 2 6102 7000
ABN: 54 74 277 1196
National Photographic Portrait Prize 2019 Finalist
Surreptitiously, I walk hallways to each room; I close doors achingly, in a backwards manner becoming apparition.
So many of us are encouraged to ‘write ourselves in’, lest we not exist. These days, I’m increasingly returning to moments of holding and witnessing myself, within the realms of the ‘unsaid’, the ‘unseen’, or the ‘unimaginable’. In the privacy of this exchange with myself that does not warrant hearing to be valued, I make some return to not being ‘fully known’.
– Raynen
Raynen is a gentle person, their manner reserved. They speak with consideration, pausing before each sentence. This image is from my second shoot with Raynen, on the roof of the co-op where they reside.
The exhibition is selected from a national field of entries, reflecting the distinctive vision of Australia's aspiring and professional portrait photographers and the unique nature of their subjects.
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