Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Kimberly Kizzia. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Hi Kimberly, thanks for joining us today. We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.

I am currently working on a mental health portrait project where I interview and photograph people with a variety of mental illnesses and tell their stories. I got interested in doing this project because of my own struggles with bipolar disorder, anxiety and ADHD. In 2020 I decided to start photographing myself and others experiencing their struggles with mental health, but took a break until March of 2022 when I had a depressive episode that lasted for a month. During that month I photographed myself in my living room each day in various levels of distress. Once the depression passed I was refocused on centering mental health in my work. I decided to reboot the project and have since interviewed over 20 volunteers and photographed a number of them in their own environments. Photographing people in their environment is important to me because I want to normalize mental health struggles, and I believe that when people see average people struggling with mental illness it will bring awareness and a sense of normalcy to the subject.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers

I’ve been taking photographs ever since I could hold a camera, but began my professional career at 16, photographing family portraits at a local portrait studio. I have loved portrait photography since high school, often taking self portraits and photographs of my friends and family, and to this day I still photograph primarily portraits. I currently run KDK Photography (kdkphotography.com), taking primarily photographs of families (kdkportraits.com), boudoir (kdkboudoir.com), and portraits of myself and others on the side. I pride myself on giving each of my clients my full attention and am sure to exceed expectations. I think that connecting with my subjects is an important part of my job, and am attentive to detail and the needs of my clients.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

When I had that depressive episode in March I could hardly get out of bed for a month. I spent nearly 14 hours a day sleeping and found it hard to function. However, nearly every day I found the strength to crawl out of bed and photograph myself; I was lucky that my family allowed me to keep my camera and tripod set up for the duration of the episode. After a brush with death (going toxic on lithium), and a new medication regimen, I was able to come out on the other side and restart my photography journey with a renewed passion for photographing mental health portraits. I took a series of images depicting mania (the opposite of depression in someone with bipolar disorder) soon after, and began searching for volunteers to photograph for my project.

Is there mission driving your creative journey?

Bringing awareness to the struggles of living with mental illness drives me. Having lived my own experiences with mental health problems makes me a passionate photographer and a great listener. I strive to depict peoples struggles accurately with both imagery and storytelling. I believe it is important to show real people struggling with their minds in order to raise awareness and advocate for destigmatizing mental health. For so many, it is a difficult topic. I hope that the images and stories I share allow people to not only understand what it’s like to live in the mind of someone with mental illness, but to also look deeper into themselves and possibly see their own behaviors in a new light.

Contact Info:

• Website: kdkphotography.com
• Instagram: instagram.com/tippingthetightrope
• Facebook: facebook.com/tippingthetightrope
• Twitter: twitter.com/kimberlykizzia

Image Credits
Kimberly Kizzia