This Conversation Classic: Brooke Shaden - On Growth and Going Dark

This Conversation with Jed Taufer

As 2020 comes to a close, This Conversation will be featuring two classic episode from the "early days". This episode featuring Brooke Shaden was originally released on January 8, 2018. Brooke explores the darkness and light in people, and her work looks at that juxtaposition. As a self-portrait artist, she photographs herself and becomes the characters of dreams inspired by a childhood of intense imagination and fear. Being the creator and the actor, Brooke controls her darkness and confronts those fears.
After studying films for years in college, she realized her love of storytelling was universal. She started photography then in 2008, excited to create in solitude and take on character roles herself. Brooke works from a place of theme, often gravitating toward death and rebirth or beauty and decay.
Ultimately, her process is more discovery than creation. She follows her curiosity into the unknown to see whom her characters might become. Brooke believes the greatest gift an artist has is the ability to channel fears, hopes and experience into a representation of one's potential.
While her images come from a personal place of exploration, the goal in creating is not only to satisfy herself; her greatest wish is to show others a part of themselves. Art is a mirror for the creator and the observer .
Brooke's passion is storytelling, and her life is engulfed in it. From creating self-portraits and writing to international adventures and motivational speeches, she wants to live a thousand lives in one. She keeps her curiosity burning to live a truly interesting story.
Self Description: Intensely anxious, powerful little creative soul.
Favorite Memory: Flying into the sky before she lost her wings at the age of 5.
Greatest Achievement: Starting The Light Space, a photography school for survivors of human trafficking in India and now Thailand.
Greatest Fear: Whales.
Favorite Book: Dune by Frank Herbert.