Thomas Duffield
Poppy Promises
Fábrica Cal Garbat
Following years of estrangement, this project traces nine years of rebuilding the author’s relationship with his father, a relationship marked by heroin addiction – a substance that becomes his own form of escape.
The series combines portraits and allegorical still lifes within a rhythmic structure that seeks to convey the emotional landscape of households living with addiction: the tensions beneath the surface, the ups and downs, the occasional calamities.
The work also acknowledges the previously undervalued role of the mother, who raised the family alone during the father’s absence, whilst photography becomes, for everyone, a different way of escaping the family’s silence and moving towards conversation.
Thomas Duffield (England, 1996) is a photographer and researcher based in London.
His practice explores the lesser-discussed aspects of his own family life, using a combination of portraiture and still life to convey the sensitive themes of his work with delicacy and a quiet lyricism.
His work has been recognised with awards such as the Wellcome Photography Prize and the Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize, and has been published in publications including Granta, The Guardian and The British Journal of Photography.
