The Impermanence of You(th): Deconstructed Portraits
These installations of light, shadow and paint create haunting images of children in order to evoke emotional responses on a gut level. Delicate constructions attempt to capture the impermanence of childhood and children as a whole. I am creating a three-dimensional space in which the viewer can experience a delicate print of a childhood object like a swing, a stroller or a wagon on the wall. Hanging several feet in front of the prints (suspended by filament from the ceiling) are empty gold-gilt traditional frames, just floating in mid-air — seemingly weightless — attempting to frame the image of the paper on the wall...but as the viewer moves around the piece, the frame no longer visually contains the image. In between the empty frame and the paper on the wall hangs a sheet of clear Mylar with an image of an infant or toddler painted in soft white and pink tones—barely visible at first sight and again suspended in mid-air with an ethereal floating quality. A spotlight directed at each work casts a strong shadow of the painted infant/toddler onto the image of each stroller or swing — creating a presence and an absence all at once.
