Travel: Beginnings: A Dark Room

- A Psychiatry Ward: A Second Home (Bulgaria) 

In this underfunded Eastern European institution, the struggles of body compound those of the mind: lack of vermin control, security personnel, mental stimulation and treatment, and basic amenities, such as bed sheets, medicine and dining utensils. Despite the gaping needs of the ward, a majority of patients return for at least a second and a third visit. Many women say they prefer a ward bed as escape to physical abuse at home; others shelter from the stigma against mental illness common to the country, alongside alienation from family, friends and employment. In other words, a second home.  

Photographed as personal work, in my home country