Shira Gold is a Vancouver based fine art photographer creating emotive, intimate environmental portrait imagery on delicate but powerfully human subjects of grief, identity and life transitions. Photographic Art Photography Grief Landscape Healing Contemporary Canadian Photographer

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Statement

Confessions of an Untamed Mind Garden

Life occasionally delivers defining moments that utterly shake you, bringing clarity, context, relief, and grief all in one breath. At age 35, I was diagnosed with ADHD, a moment that prompted a period of reconsidering my past and understanding myself in a new light.

The diagnosis was a reckoning and a release, allowing me to emotionally exhale. It prompted a deep reconciliation with my past and a new understanding of the delicate vulnerability of my busy mind, one that refuses to conform. I had always embraced my differences as character-defining quirks, though life with an untamed mind felt like a daily exercise in hurdle-jumping and emotional self-defence. It was never easy to “turn on” my linear thinking muscles when needed. My mind thought laterally—in reverse, upside down, and leaping from all directions. Academically, I felt confined to a box that didn’t make room for people like me. Trying to succeed in this context was exhausting, draining vibrancy from my view of the world. My ADHD diagnosis changed things. While I mourned the years of misunderstanding, I had a new sense of self-worth and a deeper understanding that my way of seeing and experiencing was beautiful and valuable.

The first of several series exploring my experience with ADHD, Confessions of an Untamed Mind Garden conveys the early stages of self-discovery after my initial diagnosis. Much like the function of memory, each piece layers stitched images gathered from different places, mixing movement and stillness. Atop these assembled gardens are digitally painted marks—gestures reflecting the internal rhythm of my mind. Some pieces were made with clarity and intention, others in restlessness and paralysis, informed by my new experience with medication and the fact that I created my pieces both on my stimulants and during hiatuses. The images are both literal gardens and mind gardens—an entry into my thoughts and a visual celebration of the haphazard yet perfect imperfection of an unrestrained mind.

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Confessions of an Untamed Mind Garden is available in the following sizes

32 x 24 - editioned / 20 x 30 * - editioned

40 x 30 - editioned / 24 x 36 * - editioned

48 x 36 - editioned / 30 x 45 * - editioned

56 x 42 - editioned / 40 x 60 * - editioned

* sizes for To Much Is Never Enough only

Exhibition

2026 Julia Margaret Cameron Award Exhibition, Mediterranean House of Photography

2025 Diversity, Photo SC, Columbia, South Carolina, USA

Awards

2025 Honourable Mention, Confessions of an Untamed Mind Garden, Professional (series), Nature Julia Margret Cameron Awards