Her arms became branches

This collaboration between Nik Carr and myself started as a simple delve into our mutual love of mythology, but it quickly became a deeply personal exploration of my own past and pain, a journey made much easier through the power of these mythic beings.

Icarus, sometimes there is nothing hollower than achieving exactly what you set out to, even in victory we feel defeat. Icarus came back into my life 2 days after a particularly harrowing experience, one that never would have befell me had I not spent years doggedly chasing my ambition. The lesson learned was not one of giving up, but one to revaluate, to focus in on what I had neglected.
My sacrifices had paid off but also almost destroyed me, my own dreams became my sun and my ambition that wax on my wings.

Daphne, to tend a garden is one thing but to transform your entirety into a tree, the true goal. Being able to escape betrayal, predation and pain by assimilation into the ecosystem is not only a profoundly person ambition of mine, but in a world where rainforests burn every day and the threat of extinction draws ever closer, is now not the time to run back to the forest?
to throw our arms up as branches and escape?

Photography: Nik Carr
Creative direction: Ādahmisia
Words: Ādahmisia