One of my favorite sources of inspiration over the last year has been North American 1920's circus imagery. I love the fabrics, the patterns, the dirtiness. But one of the things I love the most is the idea of what the circus was back then. 

In the era before the internet, and before photography was even very accessible, the circus was a place where the general public could "see things never seen before". Acrobats, animals from far away places (I can't image what it would be like for most farmers to see and elephant), and of course, people with genetic disorders labeled "circus freaks". 

As much as putting someone on display because of a physical difference is a horrific thing to do, I also imagine that these people much have felt some sort of camaraderie in finding others that were different like them themselves. In an era where people that were different in a community were know to be ostracized, finding a family of like people to belong to much have been incredible for some of these people. I might be romanticizing it, but there are so many days when I wish that something like that circus still existed. I still dream of running away and belonging to a family of people who live outside of what is normal and make a different and beautiful path for themselves.

Beautiful film I saw recently called Fur, which was the imaginary portrait of Diane Arbus, a cutting edge female photographer in the 1960's who was not afraid to take beautiful images of "different" people.