Project Statement
Image As Place
I began this body of work as I was nearing the end of undergraduate school. At the time, I was confronting a major change in my life and I felt as though I was moving into a vast, unfamiliar territory. The fictional situations and strangely lit settings in each of my pictures echo the feelings of apprehension and hope that were brought on by this shift in my life. Themes of movement – falling, climbing, walking, and jumping – appear throughout the series as lone characters traverse through landscapes that have odd characteristics and a sense of impending change.
I used constructions sites, or old, decrepit and deteriorating structures to make my pictures. These locations were in transition from one function to another, and I was drawn to their mysterious character and metaphoric potential. Many of the subjects in my pictures were my friends and myself: individuals who were in the midst of shifting out of the last phase of youth and into adulthood. Like me, these people were moving towards an unknown.
Though the photographs are rooted in my own experiences, I think of their fictional qualities as corresponding with a broader experience of uncertainty that is universally encountered by all people. As we navigate through life’s uncharted shifts, we have all felt alone in a strange land. By using photography’s ability to manipulate the places and situations that surround me, I seek to reflect on the ways vestiges of one chapter in life deteriorate as new and uncertain future is constructed.