Episode 6: Kelli Connell and Kiba Jacobson
Kelli Connell and Kiba Jacobson
In this episode, Chicago-based photographer Kelli Connell is in conversation with her long-term model and muse, Kiba Jacobson, along with Museum of Contemporary Photography’s curator of academic programs and collections, Kristin Taylor. Connell and Jacobson discuss topics of portraiture, relationships, and the performance of gender and identity within Connell’s series, Double Life (2002-ongoing). Additionally, they discuss works in the MoCP’s collection by Peter Cochrane, Zackary Drucker, and Rhys Ernst.
Peter Cochrane, For Michael_, 2019
Zackary Drucker and Rhys Ernst, Relationship #22 (Tillamook Dairy Parade), from the "Relationship" series, 2010
Interview Transcript
Kristin Taylor:
This is Focal Point, the podcast where we discuss the artists, themes, and processes that define and sometimes disrupt the world of contemporary photography. I'm Kristin Taylor, curator of academic programs and collections, with guest Kelli Connell and Kiba Jacobson.
Kelli Connell is a photographer who has been creating the series Double Life for the past 18 years. In this series model Kiba Jacobson plays two roles of women in a longterm relationship. Connell stitches together multiple medium format negatives to create striking compositions of Kiba in everyday and intimate moments with herself. The images reveal multifaceted questions on identity and notions of sexuality, aging, and gender roles.
Today, we are discussing a work they've each chosen from the museum's collection, as well as their experiences working together and their larger thoughts on the photographic portrait.
Kiba Jacobson:
My name is Kiba Jacobson and I am standing in the Museum of Contemporary Photography. The print that I've chosen to discuss is by Peter Cochrane and it is titled For Michael_. It is a landscape looking image. I see a drop cloth. It's a cloth that's draped and clamped up like you would in a studio, like a seamless swoop, but it has an image on it. And that's in the very center of the frame. Behind the swoop... The little cloth that's draped, is a river. And then on the other side of the bank, we've got some smaller trees and it looks like it's fall, because I don't see any leaves on the trees. It's a beautiful sea print. Not a lot of bright colors. Very natural color scheme. It's a dreary day. There's no real clouds in the sky and there's no blue. It almost looks as if it's a monochromatic print in a way.
Kelli Connell:
I'm Kelli Connell and I'm standing in front of a small 8x10 color print made by Zackary Drucker and Rhys Ernst. The photograph is entitled Relationship #2 (Tillamook Dairy Parade).
What we see here is a man and a woman sitting in front of a house, waiting for a parade, or maybe the parade is already unfolding in front of them. It's a warm day. It's very sunny. Both individuals have sunglasses on. There are flowers blooming behind them in the yard. There's a dog actually sitting in the yard who's cropped. We can't see the dog's face, but he's also sitting, watching the parade. It also appears to be a cool crisp day. They're both wearing lightweight jackets and Zackary's hair is blowing gently in the breeze.
Kristin Taylor:
All right. So welcome. And thank you both for being here today. We've never had a photographer and model or photographer and their subject talk before on this podcast. And I'm excited because we always have conversations in the museum about that relationship between a photographer working in portraiture and their human subjects. So I want to start at the very beginning and ask you all how you met and how this project began.
Kelli Connell:
Great question. So we met in Denton, Texas, at the University of North Texas, where we were both getting our undergraduate photography degree, actually years before we started this project.
Kristin Taylor:
Is that when you started photographing together?
Kelli Connell:
No, actually. So we knew each other, but not too well as undergrads. And then I took a year and a half off from school, and then I ended up moving back to the same town, Denton, for my graduate degree at Texas Woman's University. And I was working on new work and it was close to the end of my time working on my master's that I had an idea for a project. I didn't quite know what it was going to be, but because I knew Kiba and she still lived in Denton, I just asked if she'd be willing to be a model and we'd see where it went.
Kiba Jacobson:
And I think there was that small book that you had as a project from Susan Grant that was to illustrate a fortune or something. And then I was your model for that.
Kelli Connell:
Yes. So you had modeled for me a couple of times before I even started what eventually evolved to be Double Life.
Kristin Taylor:
And how do you feel about modeling, Kiba? I know that you're also a photographer yourself. So I imagine you don't have a background in acting or theater. Or do you?
Kiba Jacobson:
No. No, I don't. Being in front of the camera is pretty natural for me. And that's what I was doing when I was in undergrad too, was photographing myself. And so it felt very organic. I think that Kelli started shooting me and maybe because we were friends and felt comfortable with each other, I was open to just doing whatever. Doing whatever she wanted me to do. Yeah. And it was a lot of fun.
Kelli Connell:
Yeah. Kiba is one of those people that is a free spirit and very comfortable around anyone she meets. Sometimes I'll ask someone else to be a stand in, and she's really easy even with a stranger to work with them in front of the camera, but it's been such a pleasure working with her.
Kristin Taylor:
So let's talk about your process a little bit, since you just mentioned a stand-in. Can you tell people who maybe haven't seen your images before how you make your photographs?
Kelli Connell:
Sure. So when you look at one of my photographs, you typically see what appears to be two people in a relationship, when really it's been the same one model photographed twice and digitally manipulated in Photoshop to appear like two people. But it's really Kiba who has played both character A and character B or the two sides of the self, as I like to think about it.
So how we make the images are once we're on location at the place we've decided to make a shoot, everything is carefully choreographed. And we've thought about what clothing both characters are going to wear. But I set up my medium format camera on a tripod, and then Kiba will wear one outfit and I will wear the other outfit.
If I'm lucky I have a stand in who will be able to wear the second outfit and I can stay behind the camera. But most of the time it's the two of us, because I don't always have someone else that can be a stand in. So we set my camera on self time and then we act out different scenarios.
So back when I was shooting film... Because I've been working on this project since 2002. I would usually shoot one to two rolls of medium format film with her dressed one way. And then we would change the film, both change clothes-
Kiba Jacobson:
Sometimes in a cafe bathroom.
Kelli Connell:
Yeah. Anywhere we could. And then we would shoot the same scene as the opposite or other sides of the self or the other characters that you see in the relationship.
So after I would have the film processed... Or now I do shoot medium format digital, which really does help. But once that process is complete, then I'm able to make some small collages. I actually like to do this physically, to cut up small proof sheets, to see which figure on the left would work well with the one on the right. And then I can determine which two I'll be using to scan and manipulate in Photoshop to create the final image.
Kristin Taylor:
So I'm curious about your relationship as a muse too... Kelli one time led a print viewing in the museum about this notion of the long-term muse and these photographers who are photographing a subject over several years or an extended period of time. So this project has been going on for... Is it 17 years now? Or how long?
Kelli Connell:
Since 2002. Yeah.
Kristin Taylor:
Yeah. Wow. 18 years this year.
Kelli Connell:
18 years.
Kristin Taylor:
Which is great. And I also read about your series once in an interview, Kelli, that you said that if you were to make a portrait of Kiba, it would be very different than the way they look. That it's more self portraiture. So I'm wondering why you are photographing Kiba and what it is about Kiba that's a muse? And Kiba, how you feel about that, of yourself as a muse and seeing yourself in these images? How that is for you too?
Kiba Jacobson:
Yeah. I don't view the images at all in any way as a portrait of myself when I see the pictures. So in that sense, other than I'm starting to see more definitions of lines and things like that in the face, et cetera... Gravity starting to be a little more apparent in the pictures now, unfortunately. But that's a physical thing that's going to happen. I can see age starting to happen.
But besides that, in a picture that she's created, I mostly am acting as Kelli. So she'll describe the scene or maybe it was a memory or something actually that happened. And I'll just try and get into her psyche. "How would Kelli be?" And she'll tell me, "Okay, be really upset here. I was doing this and sitting down and doing..." And so I'll just basically... She's the art director and the art direction and all of that, and then I just try and comply. Sometimes interjecting little things or, "How about this? Or how about that?" And she's like, "Yeah, yeah. I like that." We work in tandem that way once the shooting starts.
But I see myself as... I enjoy the idea of it being a muse just because I know artists need that. And it's a pretty essential part of a lot of artists' work. And so it... I don't know. It's nice having that... I don't know if it would be a title.
Kelli Connell:
[inaudible 00:11:18]
Kiba Jacobson:
I like playing that part, though, in these pieces.
Kelli Connell:
And often Kiba gets just as excited as I do about the work.
Kiba Jacobson:
Oh, here we go.
Kelli Connell:
Sometimes she'll text me a few weeks later asking, "Which pictures worked? Which ones are they? Did that one work that we thought was going to work?" Because I don't really know on the day of if it will work. Now that I'm shooting digitally I can tell if it's in focus at least, but it does take some time to know if I nailed it or not. And we reshoot many times.
But back to your question about using Kiba as a model... So when I originally started this work... I'm trying to think back. I believe the work I was making right before that was self portraiture. So I was doing quite a few self portraits. And then I had this idea to use several figures in a scene. So when I first started shooting with Kiba, we would have five to 10 of her in the scene. Many of them. And while it was interesting to some degree, I felt like it was way too surreal. And it wasn't until there were just two of her in a scene that I really felt like I could talk about what I wanted to say about relationships and what I wanted to say about the self that's always evolving.
So oftentimes I'd get inspiration for this work from my own personal life, but then sometimes it's from what I've read or just watching people in public interact. But using Kiba, she really is acting. So she's an amazing actor that takes direction well, but also naturally will come up with ideas on her own and we'll just follow those for a while too. So she's a conduit that I'm working my ideas through.
And the tone of the images really reflects more of my personality. If we're both at an art opening together, Kiba... Many people will go to her thinking she made the work because she's in the work and my work reads as self portraiture. So it's really fun to watch that interaction. But her personality is much more outgoing and bold and vivacious, and I'm much more shy and reserved. And I think the tone of the images is really more in tune with how I am internally and externally presenting.
Kristin Taylor:
Yeah. So let's talk about your collection choices, because you both selected pieces about relationships and other subjects. So Kiba, yours, of course, does not include a human subject, but it is about the stand-in of a human subject. Can you tell us why you chose the Peter Cochrane image to talk about today?
Kiba Jacobson:
Sure. Firstly, when I was looking through the collection and came across initially, it was the For Michael, just the print without the landscape included. And I liked it okay but then when I saw the one that was For Michael_ that had the scene and all of the environment around the image, it was really interesting because it reminded me of something from the Double Life series.
And there was this one time that we were shooting at a place in Denton called Lake Ray Roberts. And we were on a little peninsula of the lake and you could see across the water to the other side. And there were trees that were... It was fall... Maybe it wasn't. But there were just branches, sand, because it was a beach area. But there was a lot of sand and it just was familiar to me when I saw that image.
And really what attracted me to it besides that familiarity was the sense of process. Because to me, that's really important part of creating an image. And I feel like when he decided to include all of that environment in there, it just offered up a sense of this vulnerability somehow about the artist and about his just honesty about how he wanted to present himself or how he wanted the image to be perceived by others. And I just really liked that... Yeah, that was what first attracted me.
Kristin Taylor:
Yeah. Well, it's interesting. As I was preparing for this interview, I was looking in depth at Kelli's website and I saw that you also have your process revealed on your website a little bit, where you have outtakes and showing how you've collaged or cut together images, which I love too. And I know that's not your final piece at all, but I appreciated that you were putting it out there for us to see that process, because I think initially people will just assume it's all done in Photoshop and that there's not this hand cutting element that you were doing with film. So I also love that about that piece. And For Michael_ is so interesting too, because he is photographing about human subjects without putting the person in the picture. And so it's interesting that Kelli's photographing about herself without putting herself in the picture.
Kiba Jacobson:
As a surrogate. I guess I would be a stand in.
Kristin Taylor:
Yeah. I love it. Let's hear about your choice, Kelli. Why did you choose that Zackary Drucker and Rhys Ernst?
Kelli Connell:
What I really love about this photograph is how mundane it is. On a quick pass if you were to just see the photograph, you might not even think that much of it. And I think that's the main point. You would see it and think, "Here's two people enjoying a parade." And that's about all you would think as you are looking at the picture.
But when you look closer, you realize there's just a few small clues that might give some other information about the two individuals. Not much though, because their clothes are very neutral and they don't have labels or other signifiers. They're actually sitting in a similar way. Both of them have their legs crossed. They're both wearing sunglasses. But if you look there, one chair is red. One chair is blue. There's a straw. That's a hot pink straw in one person's drink. And the woman is wearing flats. And what I like about the picture is it's just two people living their lives at a small town community parade.
And I know that for Zackary Drucker and Rhys Ernst, who began this project when their relationship began, they both were going through a transition where Rhys Ernst was transitioning from female to male and Zackary Drucker was transitioning from male to female. And they worked together on this work for six years, without knowing that it would ever turn into a body of work. They honestly were just recording their lives, taking pictures as it was lived, and documented as their bodies went through these pretty amazing changes.
And so as they're figuring out how their bodies are changing, it's interesting to me that photography, especially with a model in front of the camera, it is about performance and how we read photographs. We read the performance... Whether it is a staged picture or documented, there's still an element of performance going on. So seeing something that looks so mundane and quick and believable as a real image, but knowing what they must be going through on the inside and knowing that for them to pass as a man and a woman sitting at a parade with no scrutiny or judgment from the small town community from which they are sitting in and partaking in, it's actually such a big moment for them, for me. And yeah, that's what really struck me about it.
Kristin Taylor:
I think there's an important part in your work too, that we haven't addressed yet is that it's a same-sex couple, right? So in reading the images... We've had it on display in the museum before, and it's been a while since we've had them up on the walls, but we show them in print viewings all the time. But when you have people who don't know anything about the work come in and see it at first, they were like, "Oh, it's images about two women in a relationship." And it's been a while so I think people have gotten more used to seeing that represented in visual culture. And then it takes a minute for them to process, "Oh, that's the same person. How has that made?"
But at first I feel like there's a reaction too of just not seeing a lot of art made about relationships that aren't heterosexual relationships. Can you talk about that... I don't know, portion of your work, about these socially constructed notions of identity that is I know a part of your work?
Kelli Connell:
Yes. So yes, you're right. When people look at the work, they definitely see what they think is two women in a relationship. And it also reads the longer you look at the work that it might be one self that's playing both roles. And what I like about both readings is that there's this shift that happens when you look at my work, especially if it's a solo exhibition or if you're looking at a book where there's several images, because the viewer goes in thinking one thing, "Here's two women in a relationship. One looks a little bit more masculine, one more feminine maybe." Or, "Hey, on this picture, they're both feminine." Or, "On this one, they look both a little bit masculine." Or maybe you don't even think about how their gender is represented.
But as it unfolds, you start to think, "Oh, wait a minute. They actually might be the same one person." And so then many of the viewers will go back and re-look at the work with fresh eyes. And that's what is really important for me about the work, is that it raises questions about sexuality, about gender, about relationships, about societal rules, about who we should be in relationships or how we should present ourselves. And allowing the one figure, Kiba, my model, to present different sides of herself, a more masculine or feminine side, or maybe I had an idea based on a man... She was really acting out a male character. So she could do that. It just seems so free and fluid and less about the rules and labels and restrictions that our society often puts on others.
Kristin Taylor:
I remember... I know because we have the privilege of working at the same college and knowing each other. But we had for a while in our Midwest photographers project a print that you later took out of the series of Kiba pregnant. So I was hoping to ask you both questions about how the project has evolved with Kiba's life and what you were talking about earlier about seeing yourself age in the images. How you feel about the series developing with your own life?
Kiba Jacobson:
I think it was your MFA show in that the pregnant pictures were...
Kelli Connell:
Yeah, my entire MFA show was... That was 2003 and all of the images had one figure of Kiba pregnant and one figure of her not. So from the neck down it was me in every picture, which was a challenge.
Kiba Jacobson:
Beside the pregnant one.
Kelli Connell:
Right. But shortly after that, a few months after that, I realized that... Actually after Kiba had her son Elec, I did one shoot where he was included. And then I was like, "Well, wait a minute. This work doesn't feel true to me. I don't know the experience of being a mother. I can ask Kiba and learn from her, but I'm not a mother. And this work is more about what I have to say about relationships and the self." And then once we introduced Elec into... Her son's name is Elec. Once we introduced him into a scene, I was like, "Oh, no. So now there's going to be two of her and we're following this little boy's life." So quickly I realized that we were going to have to edit all of those out.
Kiba Jacobson:
Just what comes to mind... The image comes to mind when we're talking about this, the MFA show, there's a picture I have of my mom holding Elec as a baby. And we were at Kelli's MFA show and it looks like he's looking at the picture of two moms holding him. Do you remember that?
Kelli Connell:
Yeah, yeah.
Kiba Jacobson:
Oh my gosh. So yeah, that definitely more spoke about something was going on with my life in particular.
Kelli Connell:
Yeah. We've known each other for a really long time. Kiba has seen me and met many people I've been in relationships with, and same thing with her. We know a lot about each other's families and just how our own lives have unfolded over time. And that's brought us really close to one another, and it's been such an honor to be able to work with her. But also as the projects evolved over time... At the beginning, it was really about me trying to figure out how to navigate a new world where I was attracted to both men and women, but I didn't know how to get women to notice that I was attracted to women because I look so heteronormative, straight. So I would think, "Do I need to wear a baseball cap? Should I wear my jeans baggy? What do I need to do so people will know?"
So I just started to pay attention to people in public to figure out how that all worked. And so some of the earlier images are way more about that. And as my own understanding of who I am has evolved and the relationships I've been in have evolved and just through time, cultures, how society now really openly supports and accepts gay relationships or non-heteronormative relationships... That's come a long way since this first started. But now it's really important for me that as I'm now 45 and Kiba's 46, it's important that we have a wide variety of expressions of women as they age. Because in art history, there's many examples of muses or women who are in their twenties or teens, maybe young thirties, but not so many examples when women get older.
Kristin Taylor:
So is this project I hope going to continue for many more years?
Kelli Connell:
Yeah. If I'm lucky. If Kiba [crosstalk 00:27:42]. I've always told myself that if she ever doesn't want to do it, then I'm totally fine with it, but we've actually been okay with the project unfolding slowly, because I know that what I have to learn about life... I need a year or two to live life and take note of things that I want to communicate. So I'll just keep notes slowly. And then her body changes over time, just like my ideas of things change over time. And so we photograph with each other... It's not regular like we used to photograph. It's actually more sparingly, but I think that that passage of time will make the work stronger as this project goes.
Kiba Jacobson:
Yeah. It's usually now about every two years?
Kelli Connell:
One and a half or two years. Yeah. And I've been working on a new project, so I've been a little bit slow photographing for Double Life. But I think once this new project wraps up, then I'll have a lot more time to shoot with Kiba more frequently. Because it is exciting that it's almost 20 years. Yeah. Neither one of us ever thought that-
Kiba Jacobson:
No, no. And it seemed to go by really fast too. 20 years already.
Kristin Taylor:
So the work that you're doing now is more teaching and with sculpture right? And not photography. But you're still making art, is that true?
Kiba Jacobson:
Yes. I do three-dimensional work now. It seems like what happened after I had Elec and wasn't really doing photography for myself... I was starting to do Elec for myself. And so my focus and my priorities and everything just switched. I still in the back of my mind I feel like photography is my passion, but I like to really work with my hands. And so clay and found objects, sculpture and assemblage, and really just ideas that I bring to life through a physical form is what I do for myself now. Not creating or showing work. I'm still making it.
Kristin Taylor:
But that background in photography maybe helps you then be a better performer for the camera in that you know that other side?
Kiba Jacobson:
Definitely. Yeah, definitely.
Kelli Connell:
Yeah. That definitely helps because oftentimes I can let Kiba look through the viewfinder to see the scene. And because she's a photographer she really understands composition. But also sometimes back when we were shooting film, she would be finding the next roll of film or undoing the tripod. She understands all aspects of what I'm doing, which really helps our working process.
Kiba Jacobson:
I have a question.
Kristin Taylor:
Switch it up.
Kiba Jacobson:
I've got a question for you, Kelli. When Kristin said this earlier, I was like, "Oh no, does that mean no more collages?" But you would still because you're still shooting the one person and then still shooting the other person. So even though it's digital, you'll still do the printing of them and then doing the little manipulated physical collages?
Kelli Connell:
It's a good question.
Kiba Jacobson:
Kristin's shaking her head yes.
Kristin Taylor:
It's a good question. I had it on my list too.
Kelli Connell:
Okay. Well the truth is the last time we photographed together, I did rent a digital medium format camera. And when I was deciding which two images to use for the final image... Which two files to use, I was collaging those in Photoshop. So I was using the lasso tool quickly, pulling one over to another layer, making a picture. Then I would print it out and sit with it. But I really did miss that Exacto knife, cutting and sitting with each one. So who knows. Now that I bought a digital medium format camera... Which maybe many people might think I should have done that years ago, but I finally did. Anyway. I might print them out and hand collage because there is something about that by hand that's really fun.
Kristin Taylor:
And is the reception about the work changing now that Photoshop is so much more widely used when you started this project? We had it, but people weren't very good at it and it wasn't as popular. So now that everyone is using Photoshop and doing more of this digital manipulation, do people not react as strongly about the wow factor of your craft? Because your craft is so impeccable. You would never know that you're stitching them together. Is that frustrating to you that now it's easier for people to do or does it matter?
Kelli Connell:
Well, you're right. When I first started this work, many people would want to talk about the Photoshop aspects of it. Even though when you look at the images, you really don't even think about Photoshop. And for me, it's much more important that the emotion or the drama or whatever's unfolding with the relationship is the key, not the aspect of it being Photoshop. But over time I know my work is used in many Photoshop classes as an example of compositing. So many of my friends have even told me that they'd have a Kelli Connell assignment where students are collaging two of themselves in an image. So I'll see those pop up on Instagram or Facebook or other sites actually, where other students are learning how to do that. And that's really honestly a gift for me to know that my work is getting out there and that students are spending so much time with it. Not just technically, but hopefully digging in deeper to think about relationships and the evolving self.
Kristin Taylor:
Thank you both for being here. This has been really great.
Kiba Jacobson:
Thank you, Kristin.
Kelli Connell:
Thanks so much, Kristin.
Kristin Taylor:
Yay!
Thank you for listening to Focal Point. Focal Point is presented by the Museum of Contemporary Photography at Columbia College Chicago in partnership with WCRX-FM Radio. Special thanks to Matt Cunningham, Leslie Reno, and Sam White. Music is by [inaudible 00:34:15]. To see the images we discussed today, please visit mocp.org/focalpoint. You can also follow the museum on Facebook and Instagram at @mocpchi and on Twitter at @MoCP_Chicago. If you enjoyed our show, please be sure to rate, review, and subscribe to Focal Point anywhere you get your podcasts.
