Arrayah Loynd's Projects

In the days following her death, my eyes were so swollen with tears that I could no longer see. In my dimly lit room, I pointed my camera at the tv screen and randomly pressed the shutter release. Days later, I downloaded the images. I didn’t notice it at first, but what I had captured made me feel comforted in some small way. It was a fleeting moment of chance, but there in front of me was the story of her passing.

By the time the light reaches me, the stars will no longer exist... Like wading through mud; trying to understand how a prescribed medication was able to slowly drag my mind into the darkest and emptiest of voids - without anyone noticing until it was almost too late. Blending archival and contemporary images, film negatives, recaptured prints, and altered/expanded photographic techniques.

This body of work is a personal story; a visual telling of the mental and physical impacts of living with chronic pelvic pain whilst dealing with medical misogyny, misinformation, and incompetence. In a medical system where women’s pain is either dismissed or not taken seriously, I have had to learn how to advocate for myself and my needs. It is a constant battle and one that is proving very difficult to win. Sixteen years in limbo, a life stuck in a holding pattern of pain and loss with no end in sight. There is only a thin membrane between what the world sees and the lived reality of my life. I may seem fine as I mask the pain, but if you excavate, even just a little, you will find it is all completely raw. I am lost in the ebb and flow of pain, of heartbreak and despair. I am angry. I am difficult. I am defeated.

Working with my personal archive of film negatives, I create a juxtaposition between the concept of photographic memory and my experience of prosopagnosia and neurodivergence. I photographed old negatives held in my hand against various light-filled backgrounds. The majority of images are minimally processed. Others are layered images with colour input to give an insight into my experience of the world through a neurodivergent lens. It is messy, beautiful, confusing, and honest...just like my mind. _________________________________________________________ I have never been able to remember faces. I get people mixed up all the time and often walk right past people I know. When I encounter someone that obviously knows me, I switch into panic mode and stall for time as I desperately try to pick up clues from conversations, visual cues, and vocal mannerisms. The more I see a face the greater the chance it has of imprinting onto my mind, but only when I see you in front of me and in the right context. I also forget people exist if I can’t see them, even people that I am close to and love dearly. I upset people when I don’t call or see them for long stretches of time but how do I remember you if you have literally ceased to exist in my mind? I didn’t know it had a name. I didn’t know that it was a genuine neurological condition, likely related to my neurodivergence and not, as I always imagined, some personal defect that I could overcome (if only I would apply myself more). A life spent with so much shame and embarrassment for something that was beyond my control. Prosopagnosia; face blindness or facial agnosia Object impermanence; an inability to understand that objects (and people) exist when they are out of sight.

RELEASE DATE : FEBRUARY 2024 My brain doesn’t process thoughts and feelings very well. It struggles to separate things, gets them all tangled up and leaves me exhausted. Being able to express myself visually and creatively becomes a burning need. It brings a sense of relief from extreme emotions and physical sensations that I don’t always understand. It helps me to unravel the coil in my belly and the burning in my mind. This body of work merges beauty and discomfort in equal measure. It combines multiple images from a near and distant past and the continuous blending and erosion of pixels until I arrive at the visual embodiment that is the confusion of my mind. It is a complete sensory overload that reflects my internal experience of living in this world as a neurodivergent person and is designed to have no beginning and no end. Nothing is linear. TITLE: COME AND FIND ME PRICE: AUS $150 PLUS P&H SIZE: 210mm X 254mm PAGES: 110 plus small image inserts and metallic printed bookmark STOCK: Matte (various weights), metallic, lustre COVER: Handmade book jacket – translucent recycled pvc sheeting, edged with blanket stitching and japanese paper inclusions. BINDING: red powder coated metal spiral binding

Working with my personal archive of film negatives, I create a juxtaposition between the concept of photographic memory and my experience of prosopagnosia and neurodivergence. I photographed old negatives held in my hand against various light-filled backgrounds. The majority of images are minimally processed. Others are layered images with colour input to give an insight into my experience of the world through a neurodivergent lens. It is messy, beautiful, confusing, and honest...just like my mind. _________________________________________________________ I have never been able to remember faces. I get people mixed up all the time and often walk right past people I know. When I encounter someone that obviously knows me, I switch into panic mode and stall for time as I desperately try to pick up clues from conversations, visual cues, and vocal mannerisms. The more I see a face the greater the chance it has of imprinting onto my mind, but only when I see you in from of me and in the right context.  I also forget people exist if I can’t see them, even people that I am close to and love dearly. I upset people when I don’t call or see them for long stretches of time but how do I remember you if you have literally ceased to exist in my mind? I didn’t know it had a name. I didn’t know that it was a genuine neurological condition, likely related to my neurodivergence and not, as I always imagined, some personal defect that I could overcome (if only I would apply myself more). A life spent with so much shame and embarrassment for something that was beyond my control. Prosopagnosia; face blindness or facial agnosia Object impermanence; an inability to understand that objects (and people) exist when they are out of sight.

Altered Landscapes, A Visual Meditation. I live with an increased sensitivity of the central nervous system. It affects me in ways that are hard to explain but can be quite debilitating and prevents me from fully participating in life. I find peace in solitude and nature: vast landscapes, cool climates, water, mountains, trees. All of my senses are amplified. Sound, smell, sight, touch. This can be overwhelming at times but it also allows me to witness and experience so much that others miss. The colours and tones I see in the world are like a kaleidoscopic explosion within my mind. It brings me joy to immerse myself within it and is one of the few things that soothes my mind into a place of peace. A small selection of images from soon to be published book…

This series is a visual distillation of what I experience when I go into a dissociative state due to the impact of my medically induced PTSD and ASD intersecting. I have had many medical interventions in my life and have been consumed by pain with only the briefest, sweetest exhalations of relief in between. Nine surgeries, organs removed, things sewn up. One thing ‘healed’ leads to two more things to deal with down the line. No one knows what is wrong with me, my body refusing to divulge its secrets, even to those with the greatest of expertise. The thought of receiving medical treatment quickens my heartbeat and restricts my breath. Memories from the past begin to surface and burn within my body, a painful reminder that they never truly left. It triggers an overwhelming sensory response that leaves my nervous system raw and exposed. And so my mind begins to shut down, dissociating to protect myself from what has been and what is yet to come. It isn’t voluntary, I just lose my grip on reality and am birthed into another place. But it isn’t a place. It is a nothingness, limitless, soundless and without time. I become no one and nothing and I never want to come back.

I am finding the light between the cracks and fissures of my mind. I am someone and everything and I want to come back. A continuation of my journey through dissociative states related to PTSD and ASD, experiencing increasing moments where I can find the surface and am able to breathe once more.

This series is a visual distillation of how I feel when I go into a dissociative state due to the impact of my medically induced PTSD and ASD intersecting. They are self-portraits that delve beneath the surface and into the vast, dark realms of my mind. Once there, I can no longer be found in the mirror of my eyes. I lie deeper than that, deeper than even I can reach. ******** I have had many medical interventions in my life and have been consumed by pain with only the briefest, sweetest exhalations of relief in between. Nine surgeries, organs removed, things sewn up. One thing ‘healed’ leads to two more things to deal with down the line. No one knows what is wrong with me, my body refusing to divulge its secrets, even to those with the greatest of expertise. The thought of receiving medical treatment quickens my heartbeat and restricts my breath. Memories from the past begin to surface and burn within my body, a painful reminder that they never truly left. It triggers an overwhelming sensory response that leaves my nervous system raw and exposed. And so my mind begins to shut down, dissociating to protect myself from what has been and what is yet to come. It isn’t voluntary, I just lose my grip on reality and am birthed into another place. But it isn’t a place. It is a nothingness, limitless, soundless and without time. Eight hours moves like one hundred, or like one, it is hard to tell when you have disappeared. I become no one and nothing and I never want to come back.

My brain doesn’t process thoughts and feelings very well. It struggles to separate things, gets them all tangled up and leaves me exhausted. Being able to express myself visually and creatively becomes a burning need. It brings a sense of relief from extreme emotions and physical sensations that I don’t always understand. It helps me to unravel the coil in my belly and the burning in my mind. From my ongoing series ‘Come and Find Me’, these images reflect the place in my mind where trauma and memory converge. (ADHD, ASD, Trauma, Memory) _________________________________________________________ COME AND FIND ME My brain doesn't hold memory, Not much anyway. What memory there is is fragmented, Disjointed, Something that I can't quite touch But leaves me feeling confused, Frustrated and overwhelmed. My brain doesn't work in a linear fashion. It shoots off into a million different points at once, Stretching me thin and exhausted. I see fragments of words spoken And feel moments of deeds done. They hold me down and hold me back. Like a child I fold into myself, Disorientated as to what is real and what is not. Told to be good, Be still, Be silent. This world is not for the likes of me. I can try and negotiate but it makes no difference. I am frustrated and frustrating, Ask anyone. I am not who they say I am. I am not who you think I am. I am no one and nothing. I am everyone and everything. So come and find me, But only in the small moments when I want to be found. I make no promise that I will be there. _________________________________________________________ SEE MORE OF THIS SERIES BY CLICKING ON MY WEBSITE LINK ON MY LENSCULTURE PROFILE PAGE

I started my series 'Come and find me' (seen in a seperate project on my lensculture profile) here with a deeply personal exploration of my past. I submitted this small body of work as a dummy book and won the Pre-Press category at the Australian PhotoBook Awards in 2022. This win then encouraged me to continue exploring, creating and experimenting to create my final series.

This small series uses archival imagery to look into the past whilst also reflecting upon the present. It is a little side project to my 'Come and find me' series. Our old family albums are filled with photos of me looking pained and showing a reluctance on my part to be photographed. There are many images of me scowling, angry, distrustful and sometimes in tears and obvious distress. I have never felt comfortable with people looking at me. I have never felt comfortable in my body. I always wanted to be invisible to the world and found being forced to be performative in any way exhausting and anxiety inducing.  There are the occasional smiles. But not many. 'I find no comfort in this body It makes no sense I forget the rules Of what to say and do.  And it ends in mistakes 'cause they or I were broken from the start'

This series of images was created as a direct response to personal experience and the ongoing observation of how society is evolving (or devolving) to respond to female autonomy of body, mind, desire and sexuality. It is a statement on how societal attitudes ‘stain’ women in ways that are not always visible but are always felt. Looking at patriarchal control, the impact of modern day misogyny and the abuse of power and privilege, this series is a visceral and personal exploration of what it is to be woman. (Created 2021) "A woman is like white cloth: once soiled, it can be washed but never made clean again." Khmer proverb

Difficult is a project that was inspired by an Emily Dickinson poem 'They shut me up in prose' and the way language and words are weaponised against women to silence their voice and quell dissension. The women involved in this project embody strength and are not afraid to use their voice to empower themselves and others. The long term goal of this project was to include a diverse and intersectional response to the female experience in relation to gendered language. This was limited due to the lengthy lockdowns and covid restrictions we experienced in Melbourne, Australia at the time this series was created in 2020.

Created in 2013 for my photography studies final folio. It depicts the lives of a fictional family, circa 1972, and allows the viewer to peel back the veneer of normality to reveal what is hidden behind closed doors. Every family has secrets, dysfunction, things that they desperately try to hide from the outside world. Veneer is a voyeuristic view of a certain time and place and the contradictions of what is seen and unseen.