My goal with the series “*yawn*” was to create a series of staged portraits of people yawning in situations where they simply should not be yawning. I wanted to create photographs that have some effect or physical impact on the viewer, but also have a humorous aspect to them. In these staged situations, the subject would be pretending to yawn at first, but sometimes this pretending turned into a natural yawn – in this way, there is still something somewhat candid about the images.

These photographs were originally installed hung as close to the ground as possible, with the lights of the windowless room dimmed. Viewers would crouch down, catch a yawn, and maybe snooze.