I am thrilled to have A Poor Sort of Memory featured on Lenscratch and to share a deep discussion on the making of the book and my personal history as the context and impetus for this photographic journey. I am grateful for the brilliant Sarah J Winston for the thoughtful conversation. Read the entire interview here.
“A Poor Sort of Memory transports us to the Coachella Valley of California. Throughout the book’s pages I feel an uneasiness, an ominous force, one that I cannot shake nor easily discern. The pictures feel timeless, all I can trace is the heat of the California sun. This book requests one’s contemplation, and in doing so, puts the reader right there in the landscape with the photographer. The book asks that the viewer sit closely, in companionable silence with its narrator, to go in and out of various vortexes in order to find stasis. Buckle in.” - Sarah J Winston
"It initially started with a personal journey of self inquiry in an effort to preserve my past, but the camera revealed the limited subjectivity of both memory and photography. As I revisited sites of specific memory, things would not be quite as I remembered, small details were amiss, and the camera framed more out than in. This left a gap of confusion and doubt that, although initially frustrating, opened things up for possibility. Seeing the futility in the effort of preservation I was free to follow where the work wanted to go." - TLC
“In Lewis Carrol's Through the Looking Glass, the white queen says to Alice "It's a poor sport of memory that only works backwards." It's nonsensical, yet profound. It challenges the notion that memory is fixed and only in the past. It posits that memory may work in multiple directions. We are creating memories now and planting them into the future. It's disorienting, for sure.” - TLC
“Maybe I was afraid that if I forgot my story, I would be more apt to repeat it. The irony is, the harder I tried to do this, the more elusive and flawed the memories seemed. That's when things moved beyond the personal and got interesting to me as an artist.” - TLC
“That context of your life makes me look at the portals a little differently now. Some begin to feel like oracles and spiritual passages, allowing the bending of time even more; looking back and in, changing the past through engagement with it all. It’s all pretty incredible. Thank you for sharing.” - Sarah J Winston
