a series highlighting my treasured moments—the moments of peace, and of oneness—the small gifts of stillness given to me along the way. the quiet reminders to breathe.
The Space-Between
Category: photography
The Space Where I Exist
details of home
Gainesville
Florida Museum of Natural History + Butterfly Rainforest
Photography
Is there such a thing as fate? Could it be that some things are put in front of our eyes for a reason—that, through them, we might learn something vital to our being? If there is, what sort of control do we have over this, if any at all? Are some of the things that have crossed our paths by chance not by chance at all?
These things in particular —things that were once thriving and full of life, but have fallen because of their frailty in comparison with the rest of their environment—captivate me in such a way that I cannot not pass them by. Upon coming across these things, I feel a strange sort of urgency to rescue them, despite their state of uselessness—to immortalize them in photograph.
/
Dear inhabitants of the abandoned,
You exist in a seemingly indestructible reality—much like the many aspects of culture that we, as humans, use to notate status and stability. Life rooted in materiality is fragile, and possessions impermanent. With even our tightest of grasps, and strongest of walls, how easily it can all disappear.
Guatemala
Chichicastenango, 2009
Transportation Devices
Artist Statement : TRANSPORTATION DEVICES
It all began with a cell—
One cell that failed to replicate in the proper way…
More defective cells were produced, and eventually, his body began to fail him.
I went for the first time, not knowing what I would see.
A neatly framed pastel landscape of wild grasses in the breeze hung at his bedside in an attempt to convince him that the pain did not exist.
Beeping, twitching.
I could not penetrate the crisp linen that paralyzed him.
Though we were young, we knew of passion.
This man’s passion rested in transforming lifeless spaces into transportation devices–enabling anyone who encountered them to escape to another place and time.
His dependence on these devices was obvious to us. And by clinging to this, we could cling to him.
Attemping to reconcile the decay of physical connection with our father, we began to paint for him. We sought hard after the device that would make these four walls a better place, much unlike the pastel landscape that had failed him.
Satisfaction was mutual.
I have developed a dependence on art for this reason—to locate these connections between people and define them as well as to pinpoint where and through what [object or experience] do two lives intersect one another. Through the language of the photograph, I strive to rescue these ties from their intangible state and establish them as object—like bridges built between people and cultures at large.
In this series of works, I have also explored my fascination with the object as a transportation device in itself—one that can connect people…or isolate them.
BFA Thesis // University of Florida, 2009
Japan
Osaka & Tokyo, 2014
Treasures
Ocean Beach, California
//
Micanopy, Florida
KJ/P∆VIS 