Too Tired for Sunshine
CREDITS
There could be no better title for Tara Wray‘s work (b.1978, United States) than Too Tired for Sunshine. In a demoralised postmodern society, phenomena such as “the sunset” have become blatant, banal and romantic. We don’t find them exciting anymore, and often we can’t find the time or energy to even care about them. Wray manages to address this feeling by investigating the loneliness and decadence of everyday life, under a dark and comical gaze. When you feel a certain way, you can’t even stand something as simply enjoyable as sunshine.
The main characters in Wray’s pictures, almost without realising the sad situation they’re in, try to maintain a certain beauty in this melancholic, foggy limbo. A beauty that once was real, but is no longer. Like the old lady in the taxi, facing the gloomy day with the colored curls in her hair. Wray captures these daily absurdities to reflect on her own struggles with depression. Dreamlike sequences are alternated with picturesque sceneries. She may be too tired for sunshine, but she does still see beauty in little things, where many of us wouldn’t.
The photos in the book Too Tired for Sunshine are taken mostly in Vermont, the author’s adoptive home, between 2011 and today.