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Sitting Opposite Miss Havisham

Camilla Gorard

This photograph is a metaphor of a patient with anxiety and agrophobia. She compared herself and her lifestyle to that of Miss Havisham, a fictional character in the novel Great Expectations by Charles Dickens. Like Miss Havisham, she was terrified to leave the house and lived a life of fear and anxiety.

In this image I have re-created this literary character by using eccentric make-up as a device to capture the terror, confusion and fear in her facial expression. Furthermore, I have also used the relationship between camera and subject to express the patients vulnerability and feelings of isolation.

GP Attachment, Year One, 2011