Colleen Eggers

Colleen Eggers is an artist from Smyrna, NY. In 2021, she will receive a B.F.A. in Studio Art with a Concentration in Photography from SUNY Oswego. She is versed in analog, cameraless, and digital photography and has additional interests in painting and graphic design. Her art is a sensitive, unapologetic, and honest response to the world around her. She works with a variety of subjects but gravitates towards themes that deal with mental health and body image. In her downtime, she enjoys listening to music and hanging out with her cat, Kitty.

I’m an artist interested in a variety of mediums, but I am and have always been a photographer. I’m interested in conveying a variety of concepts with my photographs. My focus recently has been on the human body, mental illness, trauma, and ultimately the acceptance of these things.


Artwork about the body includes a series of vagina still lifes. Red and Pink (2019) and Blue and Green (2021) are constructed out of fruit and vegetables, which are traditional still life subjects. These images always include a food item that is considered phallic, such as bananas or squash. These images reflect on the various shapes, sizes, and textures that vaginas come in, while also trying to create positive associations with them. I wanted to create this work because the vagina is still a taboo subject for some silly reason. Additional pieces about the body include a series of nude portraiture. In Untitled #1 (2020) and Untitled #3 (2020), the body photographed has excess fat, stretch marks, and sagging skin. Even though this is normal, these are aspects of the body that are viewed very negatively in our society. Despite this, the body is lit as if it is a piece of artwork.

A series of work that I am currently working on that deals with trauma is portraits of my family from old VHS tape recordings. These aged tapes and the distortion of the low-resolution tv screen create an environment where I can photograph people without revealing too much about them. With this work, I resist the notion that survivors of sexual abuse have to stay silent in order to maintain familial stability and to protect the perpetrator. This artwork reflects on relationships that have been damaged as a result of this abuse, despite the acts being committed by one person. These tapes allow me to photograph people I no longer see, for whatever reason, as well as all the things that signify home to me. Even though bad things happened there, it’s still home, and I was fortunate enough to have people who believed me.