Still Lives
Description
Artist Statement - Still Lives
The photographic print is still perceived as an accurate and unaltered record of past events. Traditionally, it is self-contained, representing the sentiments of the precise moment that it captured. Yet when the viewer interacts with the photograph the image transforms, colliding with the influence of individual memory. When contemplating the image, a
viewer instantly associates the content of the photo with a series of subjective thoughts and emotions. The photo is no longer a singular representation of one event, but becomes a representation of the various conscious and subconscious dynamics of a subjective viewpoint.
This interaction of subjective memory with objective reality is the direct aim of my work. The images I record with the camera and then reconstruct with the computer, visually explore and manifest this relationship. In combining these oppositional elements, I believe that the intercommunication between the viewer and the image can be intensified from the onset, challenging the viewer's associations by presenting an image that already contains anamnestic elements as part of a photographic record (sometimes in varied settings).
In the virtual space of the computer, I find a way to blend an authentic record of an event with the essence of memory in order to present a subjective case history in a single image. My images are in their appearance, like movie-stills, frozen moments or still reflections of a larger story. For this reason I refer to my images as photographic "still lives." Their historical content is digitally rendered and abstracted by my own associations, and then returned to the form of a photograph. These still lives now contain a new record--that of my own subjective subconscious fears, angers, desires, and hopes associated and reassociated with an actual event.
Essentially, the photographic "still life" remains as believable to the viewer as an original photograph; however, the photographic still is no longer just a record of an event, but of a subjective association with that event. Through these images I hope to ask viewers of my work to add their own subjectivity to the image, and further, to question how much memory alters an accurate representation of a past event.