How artist Brooke Shaden destigmatized grief by leaning into fear

Pieces of You, 2025. Source: Brooke Shaden.

Brooke Shaden has always been obsessed with grief. Across her work, which ranges from photography to novel writing, the multidisciplinary artist is driven by a singular goal: to create positive moments about grief that help people feel brave in the face of what they fear most.

Shaden is not just the creator of her stories, she is also their protagonist. Inspired by the intense fears of her childhood and hard-won lessons of her adult life, the self-portraits Shaden creates with Adobe Photoshop put her grief on display for audiences in a way that feels raw and honest. Her aim is to elicit hope without shying away from the darkness that many people experience but rarely feel brave enough to explore.

Death becomes her

Even as a child, Shaden saw more depth and magic in the world around her than her eyes suggested. Her mind was filled with fantastical visions of what the world should look like and she felt compelled to bring those ideas to life.

Those early visions are what inspired Shaden to explore creative writing in high school, which led to filmmaking in college. But it was after graduating from college in 2010 with degrees in English literature and filmmaking that Shaden discovered photography and began to carve out her unique voice as a self-portrait artist.

Photography combined two other things Shaden loved: being alone and going on adventures. “Whether it’s hiking up a mountain, exploring a hidden corner of the forest, or jumping in a lake, I love being surrounded by nature when I shoot,” she says. “Each little adventure is an excuse to slow down and remove myself from the madness of daily life.”

Armed with her camera and Photoshop, Shaden was suddenly free to create any image her imagination could conceive. A common theme soon emerged in her work: death. Shaden found herself creating portraits of herself playing dead in all sorts of unlikely settings, from a freezer to a parking lot, to the middle of a field. Though her visuals have since grown more subtle, the theme of death features prominently in her work to this day, from the 2021 image, “Little Deaths”, to the ambitious photo series, “Samsara”.

The magic is in the editing

Always one to forge her own path, Shaden took the mastery of Adobe Photoshop into her own hands, teaching herself to use the latest capabilities of the software throughout every stage of her creative journey. The key to learning in this way, she says, is to start each project with a clear idea of where it’s headed and work backwards from there.

In practice for Shaden, that means visualizing every detail of the images she wants to create in her mind before even picking up her camera, from how each element will be oriented, to the colors she wants to use. With this end state in mind, she can then lay out a plan for her shoot, determine what to include in her initial image, and what enhancements she must make with Photoshop to turn the unedited base into her fully formed vision.

For Shaden, every new editing challenge that arises along the way is an opportunity to learn and develop new skills. “Many artists get overwhelmed the first time they use editing software. When you know where you’re going, you’re more inclined to find the features that will get you there, which gives you focus and makes the learning curve feel more manageable,” she says.

Shaden is a fan of the adjustment layers in Photoshop, especially Curves, which she uses to color every one of her images and give them their distinctive painterly feel. Despite her appreciation for this powerful feature, Shaden’s primary focus is the cohesiveness of her creations, which is why she pays more attention to color, texture, and the way her art comes together than to the technology she uses to make that happen.

Shaden chose Photoshop as her editing tool of choice for both practical and emotional reasons. Having been exposed to Photoshop in film school, she had already gained some confidence using the application before launching her career. As importantly, Shaden loved that the Adobe brand is deeply rooted in empowering creativity and innovation, which added to the appeal of Photoshop when she became a professional artist and decided she would only buy from companies she believes in.

Building genuine connections

Though she has come a long way in the past 15 years, Shaden’s creative process has hardly changed. That said, the reasons she creates have evolved significantly. Above all, Shaden is more mindful of how audiences interpret and internalize the stories she tells through her art.

For instance, while many people found Shaden’s early self-portraits compelling, some also felt that her graphic depictions of death were created simply for shock value. Since then, Shaden has taken the time to understand what attracts her to heavy themes like death and grief, an exercise which has helped her to refine her visual style and begin integrating more symbolism into her work.

As a foster parent, Shaden has also experienced the joy of welcoming six children into her home and loving them, and the pain of having to say goodbye to each of them when their time together came to an end. The highs and lows of foster parenting added yet another dimension to Shaden’s definition of grief and introduced new themes like impermanence to her work.

The more of life Shaden experiences, the more nuanced her art becomes and the more it resonates with her audiences. Today, she has nearly 240,000 followers on Instagram and more than 1 million followers on Facebook.

Shaden’s engagement with her followers and the artistic community also extends to the classes, workshops, and retreats she hosts each year. That includes the annual Promoting Passion Convention, which will be celebrating its 10^th anniversary this September. Shaden relishes any opportunity to share her knowledge and experience with fellow photographers, seeing it as an opportunity to improve her own editing skills as well.

“Teaching is the best thing you can do for your craft,” she says. “When you put words to your process, you’re not only helping other people understand what you do, you start considering ways to do it better. Everybody wins.”

To see of more Brooke Shaden’s artwork and learn more about her unique storytelling approach, visit her website or Instagram.