A Kind of You is a documentary work of an uncanny asian tradition, where monkeys are trained and dressed to act humanlike in order to ask money from the bypassers. Modern city culture has turned the old tradition in to eerie and haunting act of cruel street theatre where animals become something else, never able to reach our expectations. — Perttu Saksa

Finnish photographer Perttu Saksa sheds gloomy light on another strange clash of culture and nature in his newest series A Kind of You. In documenting this archaic practice, Saksa’s purposeful use of darkness adds a nightmarish quality easily evocative of the animal’s emotional state. The portraits manifest as bleak puppets peering from the blackness, their chains weighing heavy and their stage desolate and broken. Although contemporary society often tries to separate our actions from the past, A Kind of You darkly reminisces of histories still alive where man imposes upon beast in ways both strange and sad.

This post was contributed by photographer and Feature Shoot Intern Jenna Garrett.