Memory of Absence
So much of who we are is passed from generation to generation—our genes, our behaviors—molded by our family. In 2017, my mother and father—who had not lived together for 50 years—died within three days of each other. I discovered many artifacts from my life of which I had no memory.
In this series, I combined botanicals with objects and photographs that I found, in order to convey a sense of memory and loss. The organic and volatile botanicals serve as a reminder of the ever-changing nature of memory and emotions—an unstable and profoundly unreliable process.
My creative process is to compose and photograph botanicals with the collected objects I have gathered from my mother’s home. I then print out the image and create yet another still life by layering more objects with the print and re-photograph it. This creates a further sense of the complex and layered emotions found within family dynamics.