Sydney-based photographer and member of The Inspired Co. Lilli Boisselet’s latest photo series ‘Because the Night Belongs to Lovers’ is an homage to togetherness. An antidote to our feelings of separation and distance in a post-COVID world.

The series has been released as part of her Love in the Time of Corona ceramics collection and is a case-study in intimacy, connection and rawness. In the series, we see the ceramics offering both form and function, and telling a story of kinship.

Patti Smith's 1978 punk hit Because the Night inspired Boisselet when creating the series. And keeping in theme with its namesake, the series traverses feelings of longing and an innate craving for human touch.

Boisselet captures this desire in her images, where food and flesh dine together framed by soft shadows and a subdued palette with carmine, the colour of lust and passion, at the centre. The series celebrates the things we miss, sharing a meal, holding hands and hugging each other tight. The grittiness of her film offers a refreshing departure from our shiny screens and idyllic digital worlds. Bjork described it best when she said, “The more digital we have, the more naked skin and rawness we will want.” 

The ceramics featured in the series are entirely handmade by Boisselet from Australian clay with no two pieces being the same. It feels fitting that in a time where most of our interactions with each other are dulled through social media Boisselet communicates with us in a way that is earnest and tangible. 

Her eagerness to reach people and shatter physical boundaries is clear as ten percent of profits from purchases of her prints will go directly into funding the Nepal Project, an initiative of Boisselet's self-titled foundation (The Lilli Boisselet Foundation). The foundation is a profit-for-purpose body that endeavours to empower women in business in under-resourced communities.

You can view the images alongside the ceramic collection on her site.