Darkroom

Hm… Three words to describe how I felt while or after reading Darkroom: troubled, interested, and engaged. The way that Lila Quintero Weaver illustrated Darkroom was incredibly reminiscent of black and white photography, or a filmstrip, both of which are introduced through her father’s hobbies at the beginning of this graphic memoir. The connection between the author and her father clearly stems through this lens—either through a video camera or a 35mm camera, which draws connections, for me, to the lens that separated Lila from the rest of her peers. There is something so interesting that happens to an individual when they view the world through something like a camera: a barrier is created between two subjects, which can either present itself in a negative or positive way. One is able to witness less or more depending on the situation that is being viewed, and Lila existed in that liminal space.

It seemed like Lila struggled with these lenses, and almost felt detached from the racist on-goings in her town, because she neither felt black nor white (86). She literally experiences the lens of her glasses, and it isn’t until she switches to contacts that she begins to see (216) and experience. Up until that point, I felt almost as if I was being taught a history lesson from an objective standpoint. Once the lens was removed, something seemed to switch in Lila towards subjectivity instead of objectivity in telling her story.