For a long time, I didn’t trust what came easily to me.
Ease wasn’t a familiar feeling — and certainly not something I associated with intelligence or value.
I am dyslexic, though I wasn’t diagnosed until I was eighteen, almost by accident. Reading had always felt impossibly difficult, and without understanding why, I quietly absorbed the idea that I wasn’t particularly bright. A well-meaning history tutor once described me as “a lovely girl, but not very intelligent.” I carried that belief for years, despite later passing the subject with an A grade when I was finally given the chance.
Art was the one place where something else stirred. I didn’t discover I could draw until I was twelve, and photography came later still — arriving without struggle, without friction. I genuinely couldn’t see what the fuss was about. I assumed that if something felt natural to me, it must be simple for everyone.
It wasn’t until I began photographing people professionally that I started to notice something quietly significant. When clients first saw their images, the reactions were often emotional — tears, long silences, a sense of being deeply seen. Again and again, they would ask, “How did you know?”
The truth was, I didn’t always know in words. I hadn’t consciously set out to capture a particular truth — but I had recognised it instinctively, and responded to it through the camera.
That intuitive understanding was later affirmed in ways I could never have anticipated. An image I made of my two nephews went on to represent the UK in Europe and ultimately won European Portrait Photographer of the Year. Hearing the judges speak about why they chose that image — what it communicated to them, without explanation — confirmed something I had long felt but never fully trusted: that my work speaks beyond language.
I now understand that this ability comes from deep observation. As a shy child — one who sometimes stammered — I learned to read people without relying on words. Emotional intelligence became a way of navigating the world, and photography its natural expression. People feel safe in front of my lens because I know how to create space — and because I honour the courage it takes to be seen.
This shows up in every signature image I make. There is always a moment where my sitter meets the lens directly — a brave, collaborative act that asks for presence and trust. These are the images that endure: the ones that are kept, revisited, and handed down.
Taking ease seriously has changed how I value my work — and myself. What once felt unremarkable, I now recognise as a quiet, hard-earned skill. One that has deepened rather than diminished with time.