Cage

“We talk to animals but we don’t listen to them. We stroke them with one hand and beat them with the other. Freedom for Animals gives animals a voice and fights for their rights. Animals don’t need us but we need them. We must protect them from ourselves.”- Britta Jaschinski

“As soon as it is seen, each of the animals represented is placed again in its imaginary territory, freed from the two-dimensional frame and restored to a mythic ecosystem gazed at in a school textbook or on a TV program.” - Frank Horvat

“The title is ironic of course, because these animals are displaced, they don’t live in nature – much like ourselves, who live in urban jungles.”- Eric Pillot

When I start shooting photographs, the zoo is the most frequent place I go to visit. My experiences and perceptions are different from the children at the zoo, every time I see the animals inside the cage, I question myself, “What if the one inside the cage, is us, how would we feel?” Lonely, sadness, and boredom are the words that come to mind;  not to mention to the animals.

Using photography as a tool to express this relationship and feelings I have, I wish to convey the real feeling of animals to the viewer. The reason for choosing to use strategies such as color, close cropping, and dark shadows is because it will best show how lonely the animals have. In the end, I want the viewer of my photographs to walk away from the series think in animals' shoes, and question themselves about do we are still happy to see animals stay in the cage.