Ellen Stagg has been a photographer since she was 16 years old. She moved to New York City in 1996 from Connecticut to attend the School of Visual Arts where she received her BFA in Photography. She signed with her first photography agent at the end of her junior year of college. In over a decade of her career as a professional photographer she has worked in advertising, fashion, and portraiture, shooting for various magazines, look books, stock photography, and celebrities. 

Though Stagg found success in the world of commercial photography, her true passion was to be considered fine artist. After years of struggling to connect with models who would understand her vision, Stagg met Justine Joli in 2005; the award winning adult actress quickly became Stagg’s muse. Through Joli, Stagg was able to connect to other women from the adult industry. Stagg found it easy to create nude art with these “pros;” feeling inspired, she dusted off one of her old film cameras and some left over negative film and began working on multiple exposure images.

This current body of work blends Stagg’s love of nature with her love of the female nude form. Shooting with a Holga 120 film camera, Stagg photographs her models, making multiple exposures on the film. This process is repeated with elements of nature, as Stagg shoots images flowers. The multiple exposure images are flipped, creating kaleidoscoping images that mirror each other like a Rorschach test. And showing nude polaroids, that are one of a kind.