Interviewed by REOME Founder, Joanna Ellner
For the first edition of SELF-PRACTICE, REOME Founder Joanna Ellner speaks with Christine Rees, Creative Director and Founder of Serchia Gallery in Bristol, and Jess Ellis, a photographer whose still-life work is defined by sensitivity, restraint, and emotional clarity. Together, Rees and Ellis have formed a creative partnership rooted in shared values — one that prioritises care, intention, and human presence over speed or spectacle.
Joanna: How did you both meet and how did your unique creative partnership come to be?
Christine: I think a lot of things you come across that you're like, ‘where have you been all my life?’ I came across Jess's work when she was this amazing set designer who collaborated on a concept using napkins and I was like, oh my God, something as humble as a napkin has been made into this beautiful masterpiece series. Who is this woman? And I started following her work.
I seem to recall I was on my soapbox about something I'm really passionate about - authorship when it comes to art and photography. I think there's a lot of people out there who are finding beautiful work, posting it online, and I was like, ‘that person made this’, ‘this person spent all day doing this’. I was like ‘if anyone needs any recommendations and names, please come to me, I will find out the source, just message me’. You said that you’d love to have more sources and we started talking.
Joanna: So, you first connected through Instagram?
Jess: Yeah. About two years ago. I think the thing that's so wonderful about Instagram, despite everything having its pros and cons, is does allow you to connect with people in such a different way. Even when I reach out to anyone that I want to connect with on the work side of things, my confidence is much higher doing it through a message on Instagram than through an e-mail. I just think there's a sensitivity to it, maybe because you already can link to a profile and you can get a feel for someone.
Christine: But the first time we collaborated together was on a still life shoot for Estelle [Dèvè], for Dèvè. We had these amazing clients, and she is in her own right this amazing force of nature who's imbuing beautiful, unique creativity into everything. I was like, God, this has to be good. I have to make everything perfect. But we came up with a concept that was really personal to me and everything was just so natural. Jess and I, if we think something, we just say it out loud and the other one gets it and we don't have to filter anything. Nothing's censored, it's just from the heart.
Jess: When we got on and then became friends, we were very fortunate that we both were in Paris last year and hung out, had dinner together. That actually is what has turned out to be this work relationship which has also turned into a friendship, which is even better. The fact that we worked together - talking about that shoot that we did with Dèvè - whenever we're doing something, whenever we're working on something, we keep pulling back to ‘what does it mean to us?’ and what are we trying to say.
I learned from a friend that as long as you stay true to yourself, that will always be the best work you’ll ever make. You're not people pleasing anyone because you're just staying true to what it is that you want to do. That's something I've really tried hard to do because I've assisted for a long time and it's like being in a class. You look over and someone's done an amazing drawing, and you look over at another amazing drawing and you're like, ‘oh, I want to copy that.’ But it's very hard to make it your own.
Joanna: It sounds like finding an authentic visual voice is central to your work...
Christine: I think more than ever people are looking for things that are real and unique and like Jess was saying, true to your own voice. AI is kind of the antithesis of all of those things. It takes something that someone spent their life learning how to do and lets anyone feed off information and talent that they didn't earn.
I think more than ever, in the same way that anything made by hand or made by a human, there's becoming more of a priority to do things your own way in a unique, visibly human response. That's so important and it's something people crave. They're always looking for what's genuine and real and people can see through AI.
Anything that replaces humans is putting quantity ahead of quality, and that's the opposite of what I always try and do. I would rather have one person that is my audience and have them see things correctly and beautifully the way they were intended, than feed the algorithm so a million people see it in their feed. In this world where journalism is becoming clickbait and everything is numerical - how many likes, how many views - the thing that sets something apart is a unique voice.
Jess: I haven't properly explored AI. I think that might be because I'm nervous about it and how it can affect us. I hold on to the hope that when something has had time, thought, passion and a full story you just have a real feeling for it and a love for it. You want to spend time on it and explore that photographer's work or whoever has been part of it. There's a real genuineness and I really feel that that is so obvious when I see work like that.
Joanna: For REOME, I made the decision quite early on that we weren’t going to use AI for shoots. There is something instinctive in how we respond to images - particularly for women, I think. Do you feel the feminine perspective plays a role in how you create images?
Christine: Absolutely. Every time. Especially the more digital visual information becomes, we always want it to feel softer because something about that makes it feel tangible. The more technology improves the sharper the image, but there is something about softness that feels comforting. I think we're always trying to create things that people want to spend time with and time is the most important currency of all. The more attention you earn from someone who observes the image the better.
Joanna: Tell me about your creative process together. How do ideas evolve between you?
Jess: I've been on multiple shoots where there have been a lot of men or a lot of women. I've always noticed that when there is a strong female team it's the attention to detail that is always focused upon and is given the same level of attention as the full image seen as a whole. Christine and I work so well together because we come at each project with a sincere amount of intention and attention to the detail. Even for your project the amount of soap dishes I went through to find the right one that mimics what I'm trying to say.
For us there's a huge quantity of images that we are shooting and then it's about how can we get better, how can we finesse this more. We work remotely so it's constantly sending images back and forth saying OK have you tried this, try that. And building and building and building.
Joanna: How do you communicate during that process?
Jess: Voice notes, WhatsApp, Zoom. Anything that gets the message across better.
Joanna: Do you begin with a concept or pulled references?
Christine: The idea always comes first. The most important thing is the concept behind what you're doing and that defines the guidelines for every other choice that you make. Usually, two words will come into my mind, and I'll be like this is the concept and then I'll pull references to share with Jess. I also love doing a deck. There's no greater joy for me than coming up with a concept and being like this is what this concept means and everything that's important about it.
Joanna: How do you define your roles within the creative partnership?
Christine: Art director or creative director is the term that I use. Concept is my one true love but inspiring people to be themselves to the best that they can be is a big part of what I do. The process Jess and I go through has massively been informed since I've started running a gallery because I speak with artists every day about their work. Artists show me something they've been creating for years and it's often the first time someone's seeing it.
Joanna: When Jess is shooting, are you usually together or working remotely?
Jess: If we can ever get together, we will always choose that but sometimes I work from home. I get completely immersed in my own little world.
I just need a window, a table and I make my own sets. It's a layering process - try this, tweak, adjust - until you get to the point where you're like that's it, it's done.
Joanna: Where do you both go for inspiration?
Jess: I'm collecting references all the time - Instagram, Pinterest, books, things I've seen, photographs I've taken. When we come up with an idea we go through our archive of references and pull fragments from each one.
Christine: Sourcing references is what I would do for fun at any point. I save everything I'm drawn to and come back to it later. Sometimes it's the light, sometimes the composition, sometimes the way that it made me feel. Running the gallery also means I meet so many artists and have an archive of books. There's a lot offline that people don't necessarily have access to and that's a gift.
