Number & Lifetime 04-05
I worked on a series of documentary photographs of people I didn't know and others who were my personal friends. I allowed myself through this work to present an unpretentious depiction of these people's temporal and internal expression in an attempt to underscore the degree of realism and integrity in archiving and identifying numbers with the visual elements of the picture.
The viewer is also driven to search for that which is outside the picture. What is presented is merely a number and a body part, a hand. The viewer searches for the person whom that hand belongs to. Who is it? What does he or she look like?
The hand symbolizes many things.. The feel of a hand also reveals things: a soft hand indicates a rich and easy life, while a coarse hand belongs to one who toils endlessly and perhaps enjoys the arduous things in life. The lines and marks on fingers and palms also have a story to tell. This work is a demonstration of the effects of time on human nature. The first part of the work is composed of two large photographs hung up on the wall. The second part is an installation bearing the shape of a suspended shelf upon which lies an alphabetized archive of 27 files containing almost 2000 photographs and information on the people whose arms were photographed and who were interviewed by the artist. The personal information contained includes the name, age, nationality, and profession, and the files have been arranged alphabetically from A to Z. The third part of the work, which imparted a perpetual aura to the work, is the photo studio.
The viewer is also driven to search for that which is outside the picture. What is presented is merely a number and a body part, a hand. The viewer searches for the person whom that hand belongs to. Who is it? What does he or she look like?
The hand symbolizes many things.. The feel of a hand also reveals things: a soft hand indicates a rich and easy life, while a coarse hand belongs to one who toils endlessly and perhaps enjoys the arduous things in life. The lines and marks on fingers and palms also have a story to tell. This work is a demonstration of the effects of time on human nature. The first part of the work is composed of two large photographs hung up on the wall. The second part is an installation bearing the shape of a suspended shelf upon which lies an alphabetized archive of 27 files containing almost 2000 photographs and information on the people whose arms were photographed and who were interviewed by the artist. The personal information contained includes the name, age, nationality, and profession, and the files have been arranged alphabetically from A to Z. The third part of the work, which imparted a perpetual aura to the work, is the photo studio.
