The Candid Island

Select images from my series 'The Candid Island'. This selection is of groups of people encountered at random from six months in Bali and Lombok in 2018. This series attempts to show how street photography can be used as a powerful tool to challenge wide-ranging stereotypes beyond the realms of capturing a single random incident. I suggest the tourist nature of the islands of Bali and Lombok causes the local people to constantly wear a mask in order to protect local livelihoods by presenting an idealized version of the islands to visiting people. I believe the everyday obligations of work and school balanced by leisure and play are infrequently represented in the visual material around these islands. This series is not focused explicitly on a compelling incident. It is an exploration of how these islands, which are some of the most visited and photographed on Earth, are so frequently presented in the framework of a glorified tropical island paradise. Street photography often seeks to juxtapose people and place within an image. This series is a candid presentation of people and place in the context of their everyday lives, using street photography as a tool for challenging the stereotyped perceptions of this existence, in this case, what we believe about the islands of Bali and Lombok versus what we see in them.