Teen Lives, Interrupted by COVID

In Teen Lives, Interrupted by COVID, Elinor Carucci turns her lens toward the psychological weight of adolescence in the COVID-19 pandemic. The portrait series, taken between 2020 and 2022, documents American teenagers confined to their bedrooms during the COVID-19 pandemic—the domestic spaces where they have spent inordinate amounts of time over the past two years. With a background in autobiographical photography and intimate portrayals of her family’s life, Carucci draws from this dual role as both mother and artist, photographing her own teenage twins, Eden and Emmanuelle, alongside other New York adolescents. The portraits are both personal and deliberate. Many of them were taken in bedrooms filled with everyday details, like posters, pets, and narrow twin beds. The lighting has a dramatic chiaroscuro effect (the use of strong contrasts between light and dark), often creating a moody, introspective atmosphere and a theatrical stillness. While these images might seem spontaneous at first glance, they are carefully composed, with Carucci using framing and light to heighten the emotional resonance of each scene. Her photographs are never intrusive or overly dramatized. Instead, they invite the viewer to quietly observe, to sit for a moment with the tension and stillness that define so much of life in lockdown.

Each portrait is paired with a short reflection or statement from the subject. The 17-year-old Madeline Hill describes the experience of pandemic life as, “We are in this state of: you just pull all these live shrimp into a boiling pot, and you just expect them to hang in there, and wait for the finished product. But they are in this pot and they’re squirming in there, and they have no idea what’s going on” (Mead). Her metaphor captures the confusion and helplessness many young people have felt during lockdown. As Rebecca Mead notes, even before the coronavirus struck, American teens were facing a sharp rise in depression, anxiety, and suicide. The pandemic only intensified these trends. Carucci’s series recognizes the complexity of what teens have lived through and makes visible the emotional labor of young people forced into a prolonged state of uncertainty, isolation, and developmental arrest.