Traditional Family Values

2022, Medium Format

In Traditional Family Values, I construct a fictional narrative centered around a housewife who murders her cheating, closeted husband. While the story is intentionally melodramatic and absurd, it serves as a visual vehicle to explore ideas of performance, identity, repression, and gendered expectation within domestic life.

I’m drawn to heightened cinematic imagery that teeters between glamour and grotesque, where artificial beauty masks darker truths. This project leans into that tension. Each image is meticulously staged using props, wardrobe, and saturated color to evoke a hyper-real world that feels both familiar and unhinged. The characters are not people; they’re roles. Their exaggerated expressions and environments reflect the societal scripts we’re handed, especially around gender and sexuality.










©2025
Luca Varano
All rights reserved.