In her ongoing series The Western Springs Project, Tash Hopkins questions the misguided stereotypes placed on New Zealand youth.
Tash Hopkins is a photographic artist living in Auckland, New Zealand whose long-term projects turns a new lens on portrayals of age, gender and identity.
Central to her practise is a desire to challenge social preconceptions by disrupting the visual clichés that stereotype and homogenise individuals or subcultures; instead inviting the viewer to engage from a place of enquiry. Tash photographs people whose lives differ markedly from her own. At the heart of this outsider perspective is a desire to gain insight into the unfamiliar and to investigate the biases and assumptions that arise from society or the media.
She chooses to work predominantly with a large-format camera, a process she likens to “pressing pause on the world”. This method, along with her non-directive approach allows those she photographs to participate in the creation of images notable for their intimacy and authenticity. Her work offers the viewer a unique opportunity to encounter another person on their own terms.