It began, quite unexpectedly, at an aquarium.

While visiting Long Beach with her husband, photographer Elizabeth Waterman paused in front of a jellyfish tank. Drawn to their otherworldly forms and hypnotic movement, she captured a few images using a simple snapshot camera. At the time, the photographs felt like a spontaneous aside, nothing more.

But that changed when she returned home.

Reviewing the images alongside her ongoing work photographing pole dancers across Los Angeles, Waterman noticed an intriguing visual resonance. Placing the two sets of photographs side by side sparked an immediate reaction. “I thought it was kind of intriguing,” she recalls. “I called my husband into my office, and he was intrigued and encouraged me to develop more diptychs of a similar nature.”

That moment in 2020 laid the foundation for Propulsion, a series of twelve diptychs set to premiere this May at Photo London, presented by Albumen Gallery.

A Dialogue in Motion

At first glance, the connection between jellyfish and dancers is formal: both are bodies suspended in motion, illuminated against darkened space, captured mid-gesture. Yet the relationship extends beyond aesthetics.

For Waterman, both subjects evoke the same instinctive response—a sense of awe. The drifting jellyfish appears choreographed, its movement fluid and mesmerizing. The dancer, suspended in air, defies gravity with equal elegance. “It’s the same moment,” Waterman explains. “Your mouth falls open—one of those sudden, electric moments where everything just stops and you think, whoa.”

By pairing the images, the diptych format invites viewers to linger in that moment and reconsider their perceptions. Waterman has long sought to challenge conventional views of pole dancers, whom she describes as “glamorous, almost otherworldly creatures” capable of captivating an audience.

Placed beside the neutral beauty of marine life, those preconceived ideas begin to dissolve. Viewers often find themselves focusing less on the identity of the dancer and more on the visual poetry of the image. “They’re simply swept up in its beauty.” she says.

Rather than provocation, Propulsion offers a quiet shift in perspective—an invitation to see differently.

Refining the Vision

What started as an intuitive pairing evolved into a carefully crafted body of work. Waterman developed her signature style through the use of specialized 35mm film and carefully crafted lighting. Both jellyfish and dancers are photographed with the same approach: a carefully controlled lighting design, translated across entirely different environments.

This technical consistency reinforces the conceptual link between subjects.

Over time, Waterman traveled around the world, photographing jellyfish in a range of conditions, and describes each experience as welcoming. Eventually, it was her husband and collaborator who urged her to bring the project to a close. “He said, ‘You’re done—you have enough for a gallery show, even a book.’”

Scarcity and Stewardship

For Stephan Schmid, Director of Albumen Gallery, Propulsion represents a natural progression in Waterman’s artistic journey. The series situates sensuality within a broader, more universal context—what he describes as “a wider context of sensual life.”

At Photo London, Waterman’s work will be shown alongside Ancient Dialogues by William Stewart, another series employing the diptych format to bridge past and present through visual conversation.

In contrast to today’s constant stream of imagery, Waterman has chosen restraint. Ahead of the exhibition, only two pairings from Propulsion have been released. The works are produced in small editions, with medium prints limited to five and smaller works to twelve.

For Waterman, this scarcity isn’t a marketing strategy but an expression of care. Each image, shot on analog film, is shaped by time, intention, and patience. “I view it like I’m the mother of this work,” she says. “But the haunting, otherworldly beauty belongs to God—I’m just bringing it into the world, a steward entrusted with its care.”

In some ways Elizabeth Waterman’s most recent body of work represents a logical next phase in her creative journey. The ‘Propulsion’ diptychs pair studies of jellyfish and pole dancers. The juxtaposition strikingly conveys the visual synergy and aesthetic dynamics between the two very different subjects.
In ‘Propulsion' Elizabeth Waterman takes her creative exploration of sensuality uniquely one step further into a wider context of sensual life – testament to her continued creative inquisitiveness.

Photo London - a fixture in the diaries of discerning international collectors is an ideal platform for launching this extraordinary body of work. - Stephan Schmid, Albumen Gallery

Propulsion will be on view at Photo London from 14–17 May 2026 at Olympia London.