The fragile truth of photographs: Unseen faces and inherited stories
Mixed media
125,5 cm x 125,5 cm
Artist’s Statement
This work is an intimate exploration of memory. The dichotomy between the hope with which we capture photographs and the reality that even the happiest memories often become layered with pain.
It consists of 441 individual “fragment blocks” created using cuttings made from black and white photographs, photo negatives, gold paper, pigment stamps on paper and cardboard. These photographs and negatives (of places, landscapes, and people) belonged to my grandfather and were passed down to me. I never got to meet my grandfather. But by studying his photographs, I met the man who lived behind the lens. I sought to know him, and in doing so, better understand the unresolved impact he left on my father, and by extension, on me.
I did not make cutouts of the faces of the people he photographed. I rather made cutouts of legs and shoes to represent people. While deeply personal, this work explores universal themes of familial complexity – pain, fracture, distance and longing.
The grid structure of the work echoes cycles of familial repetition. Joy, love, hurt, separation, longing and attempts at healing.
For me, the fragment blocks represent mental imprints that change, distort, fade, or sharpen with time. Illustrating how fragile the act of remembering can be. It begs the question of whether photographs can really preserve truth.
The work reflects on how, unfortunately and unintentionally, trauma is often inherited and passed on.
The absence of faces invites viewers to reflect on their own hurt, memories and stories.