Dzień Dobry. Hello. G’day. I’m Keren.
I’m a wanderer, a thinker and a deep reflector.
I am curious about the threads that connect us — to one another, to the places we call home, to the cultures and stories that shape us, and to the experiences that quietly become part of who we are.
Sometimes my wandering is literal.
I live in a small country town in Victoria, Australia, where life moves at its own pace and the landscape is never far away. I have spent time travelling through Europe and have also lived in the UK, carrying pieces of those places, cultures and experiences home with me.
At other times, the wandering is inward.
Connection. Identity. Culture. Spirituality. Belonging.
These are ideas I return to throughout my life. Where do we belong? What connects us? What do we carry with us? What makes a person or place feel like home?
Much of my working life has centred around social connectedness — working alongside people experiencing social isolation and helping them rediscover their connection to the world around them, their values, interests and motivations, and the people, places and things they hold dear.
That experience has taught me that belonging isn't necessarily found in just one place. It can live in a person, a landscape, a language, a tradition, an animal beside us, a memory we carry, or something seemingly insignificant that holds meaning only to us.
Perhaps that is why I photograph the way I do.
Learning to Notice
Photography has always been part of my life. At first, it was simply a way of recording the world around me — preserving people, places and moments I didn't want to lose.
But I reached a point where I wanted something to shift. I wanted to explore new possibilities, reconnect with my curiosity and find another way of engaging with the world around me.
Around 2018, that search led me to begin my 365project, committing to taking one photograph every day.
One year became another, and another. What began as a daily photographic challenge gradually became part of the rhythm of my life.
At a time when I needed to reconnect with myself, the camera gave me a reason to turn my attention towards the world around me. Every day I had to find something — a moment of light, an overlooked detail, something beautiful, something curious, or simply something worth remembering.
Slowly, the practice changed the way I experienced life itself.
Instead of waiting for something extraordinary, I began noticing what was already there. The ordinary became interesting. The overlooked became worthy of attention. Small things became reasons for gratitude.
The 365project gave meaning and structure to my days, a solid foundation from which to grow, and brought wonderful people into my life. It made me more curious, more positive and more engaged with the world around me.
My photography grew alongside me. The daily practice strengthened my composition, pushed me beyond point-and-shoot photography and encouraged me to explore manual settings, different techniques and editing. Over time, I began discovering my own ways of working and new possibilities for creative expression.
But perhaps its greatest lesson had very little to do with cameras.
It taught me to appreciate what was already there, to love more deeply, and to notice what I might once have passed by.
That curiosity continues to shape the way I experience the world every day.
I am a big-picture person who also loves to delve into the details. I can be equally captivated by the vastness of a night sky and the tiny world revealed through a macro lens. One asks me to look outward; the other asks me to come closer.
To me, they are connected.
Both remind me that there is always more than what we first see — patterns, relationships and threads running through life at every scale, from the immense to the almost invisible.
The same curiosity follows me when I photograph people. I favour naturalness over perfection, giving people room to simply be themselves — to show up as they are rather than become something for the camera.
I look for gestures, relationships and unguarded moments that speak quietly of connection, identity and belonging. There is something meaningful to me about allowing a photograph to hold a person without trying to define them.
Photography also gives me a language for the things that can be difficult to put into words. Through the world around me — light, movement, colour, people, nature and place — I can give outward expression to something happening within.
A photograph may begin with what is in front of me, but often it becomes a reflection of something much more personal: a feeling, a question, a memory, or an emotion I am still trying to understand.
Through what I see around me, I find ways to express what I carry within.
Sometimes what I want to express cannot easily be contained within a recognisable subject.
That is where abstract photography gives me freedom. Through movement, colour and rhythm, I can explore feelings, emotions and atmosphere without needing to make them literal.
I love the openness of abstraction — the way the same image can hold something entirely different for each person who encounters it. The viewer brings their own memories, experiences and emotions to what they see.
Perhaps that is another kind of connection — where my own experience leaves room for someone else to find theirs.
FINDING MY WAY HOME
Photography helps me understand the world around me, but increasingly it has also become a way of understanding myself.
I am deeply proud of my English and Australian heritage by blood, and of the Polish heritage that is woven into my life through love, family, language, culture and tradition.
For much of my adult life, being a Polish wife and mother formed an important part of how I understood who I was.
Life changes. Children grow. Relationships change. Familiar roles shift.
And sometimes we find ourselves asking again:
Who am I now?
This chapter of my life is one of rediscovery and reinvention.
Photography is part of that process — a place where I can reflect on where I have come from, what life has taught me and the choices that lie ahead.
It helps me recognise what still holds meaning, what I treasure enough to carry forward, and what no longer fits the person I am becoming.
In that sense, the camera is both a window and a mirror — a way of looking outward at the world while continuing to understand my own place within it.
And at the centre of that is Heartside.
Heartside is so much more to me than a name. It is a way of living — an expression of who I am, what I value, and how I choose to experience the world.
It began as the name I gave my home, but over time I have come to understand that Heartside is not confined to a place. It is something I carry with me — a way of approaching life with warmth, curiosity, openness and a desire for connection.
When I first stepped into the house I now call home, I knew I wanted to give it a name that represented more than a physical place. I wanted something that reflected a living, breathing centre of my life — somewhere filled with warmth, welcome and belonging.
I wanted a name that spoke of heart and soul, of connection, and of living from the side of ourselves that knows what truly matters.
So I called it Heartside.
Today I share Heartside with my two English Staffordshire Bull Terriers, Boots and Reksio. My three children are grown, but the threads of family, memory and the life we have shared remain part of what is carried into this space.
Heartside holds reflections of the things I treasure — the people and animals I love, the stories and memories I carry, and the curiosity to keep discovering what comes next.
It is not simply a place to settle, but a place from which my life continues to expand.
Most of all, I hope anyone who finds their way into the spirit of Heartside feels, even for a little while:
There is a place for me here.
When it comes to giving my photography a name, Heartside Photography feels natural.
It isn't simply about photographs taken at home.
It is about carrying something of the heart of home with me wherever I wander — warmth, curiosity, openness, connection and the belief that somewhere within this vast and complicated world, we are all searching for the places where we belong.
IF YOU FOUND YOUR WAY HERE...
I hope you feel welcome.
I hope something here makes you curious enough to linger a little longer, look a little closer, or notice something you might otherwise pass by.
Perhaps a photograph reminds you of somewhere you have been, someone you love, something you have forgotten, or something already present in your life that deserves to be seen again.
Most of all, I hope you leave Heartside with a little more appreciation for the people, animals, places and small moments that make your life your own.
And perhaps, somewhere amongst these photographs, you find a thread that connects something in my world with something in yours.
When I pick up my camera, I am looking for the missing piece, the unexplored avenue, the thread that connects one thing to another.
And I am still wandering to see where it leads.
