Whimsical, scrappy, intuitive

Photography By Dara Feller

Los Angeles portrait photographer Dara Feller opens up about the catharticness of self-portraiture, thinking on your feet, and the eternal struggle of comparison.

Los Angeles, USA

How did you begin your journey as a photographer?

When I was around 12, my grandfather passed and left me his camera— a Canon Rebel I believe (very chic). I had always been artistic, obsessively illustrating, coloring, painting, doodling, sculpting— anything I could get my hands on really. Playing around with that camera unlocked a part of my brain I hadn’t used before. I played in photoshop, dodging and burning things into oblivion. This was back in the heyday of Tumblr, which I think informed and helped my journey by providing the visual inspiration I never knew I needed.

What have you learned along the way?

You have to be solitary in some capacity. Yes, it is incredibly important to have an artistic community, to scroll instagram for inspiration, moldboard on Pinterest. But your work is yours for a reason. The comparison kills me sometimes! I get overly obsessed with other peoples greatness that I let my own flame burn out. My friend Jacob once told me something along the lines of “you dislike your own work because it looks like your work, but thats the same reason other people like it”. I think about that a lot— the closeness to my own work/subject matter has skewed my perception of what is “good”. No one else is looking through the pixels like I am, no one else knows my process or what “could’ve” been the final product. Let it be.

Lots of your work focuses on portraits and people. Why does this subject matter inspire you?

I’m a deeply social person. I get my energy from being around others. As much as I loved every other medium, I felt my personality atrophying slowly throughout the execution of the work. I love capturing someone’s essence, and I love to bring that essence out of them. In terms of my self-portraiture, I find photography is the most direct pipeline from concept to ideation. Most of my self-portraits are based on my writings/journal entries. I’m obscenely theatrical. I never felt I could convey the right emotions or viscera through a painting, it’s like my drawing hand was hindering the rest of my body in expression, if that makes any sense. The physical act of modeling my own writing is cathartic and gets me the result I want more consistently than any other medium.

How would you describe your style?

Whimsical, scrappy, intuitive.

Tell the story behind one of your images.

My most recent self portrait(s), “Somebody’s Fool”. I had been in a relationship where I was feeling mistreated, but kept sacrificing my self for the promise of that closeness. I like to play on words/idioms. I thought a lot about who I wanted to be as a person, as a woman, and that was “nobody’s fool”. Take no shit, prioritize yourself, good will come to you. But my heart gets in the way, and I always end up “Somebody’s Fool”. It was extracted from a journal entry, the quote in its entirety being: “I kneel at the altar of an indifferent man; At least I’m somebody’s fool”. The idea struck me and I rushed to look through my prop box. I had crafted this cone out of synthetic hair about two years ago, for a project that never came to fruition. I loved the idea of a built-in dunce cap, something I will never be separate from. In about an hour of hair and makeup and playing dress-up, I had my images.

When working on a portrait shoot, what is your process like?

Every portrait shoot has different bones, but usually it starts with concept. I am as much a creative director as I am a photographer, so I am very pre-production heavy. Most of my conceptual shoots begin with hand drawn sketches and notes in my journal. There’s an element of the tactile that is required for me to feel connected to a shoot (I.e., sketching out my idea first).

As a photographer, what were some challenges you've experienced? How did you overcome those challenges or are you still experiencing them?

Comparison is the greatest eternal struggle— for any artist, I think. I anticipate I’ll experience it forever. Competitive nature and comparison is good in small doses, it makes you push yourself to become better. But I am so often drowning in other people’s greatness. It ebbs and flows.

What are your strengths as a portrait photographer?

Thinking on my feet. No amount of preproduction really prepares you for what happens on that set on that day. There are so many factors to getting the perfect photo— a large part is interpersonal with the rest of the crew or with your subject. I’m comfortable with my scrappiness, to make something out of nothing, to use and lose aspects of a concept to my best ability. You can’t be married to anything, you just have to go with the flow on that day.

If you could have dinner with three other photographers, dead or alive, who would you choose?

Cindy Sherman, Tim Walker, Alex Stoddard. Alex is a very good friend of mine now, he’s also my forever inspiration. So Alex, if you’re reading this, let’s get dinner with Cindy and Tim sometime soon.

If you could photograph any celebrity/well known person, who would it be and why?

Miss Taylor Swift, who I was lucky enough to capture during the Eras Tour. I’d love to do portraits with her. She is also very theatrical, which is what has always drawn me to her since I was a little girl. I think we could make some magic— she’s so beautiful, but I would love to unlock more facets of her that I think few shoots have accomplished in her editorial lifetime.

What is your dream project?

A self portrait series. I’ve been pitching a project called “YOUR GOD IS IN CALIFORNIA” for a while to various grant opportunities. I want to do a roadtrip through California, stopping for self portraits along the way, exploring a time in my life where I was not at all in control. There’s something so enticing about a long road and large fields to run in.