Home Front cover PHOTO ESSAYS LIFE FORCE
The magazine of the art-form of the photo-essay
June 2016 issue
Some Kind of Divine
by Ruth Kaplan
A free, really high quality photo-essay magazine.  Fabulous! Stephen Fry. British actor, writer and film & documentary maker
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From the early 2000s to 2011, I photographed social behavior in church environments as part of an exploration of the nature of faith. What first attracted me to churches was the ritualized spectacle that unfolded as theatre, and the lack of boundaries between strangers. The passion of believers supersedes social restraint, while creating its own code of behavior. I tried to explore this world through the physicality of its players, the posse of believers. The authenticity of the participants was rarely in question but I found the space between rational thought and religious surrender uneasy. Transformation from one to the other seemed vast, impossible, yet one that many accomplish. My view evolved from a romanticized exoticism towards a more critical vision, revealing human susceptibility.
Restitution Bethesta Tabernacle Church, Toronto, 2001
Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship, Toronto, 2005.
Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship, Toronto, 2005.
Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship, Toronto, 2005.
Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship, Toronto, 2005.
Destiny and Dominion Church, Toronto, 2007.
Revival Pentecostal Church, Halifax, 2005.
Novas de Alegria Church, Toronto, 2009.
Amor de Deus, Toronto, 2009.
Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship, Toronto, 2005.
Seventh Day Adventist Church, Mississauga, 2000.
Rhema Ministries, Toronto, 2007.
Faith Impact Church, Toronto, 2011
Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship, Toronto, 2005.
Church Without Limits, Toronto, 2007.
Rhema Ministries, Toronto, 2007.