Books

Architecture | Alternative Process | Automotive | Electrigram | Glitch | Journalism | Live Music | Street | Marine Layer | Portraiture | 64

My current work, e·lec·tri·gram, is a series of photographic books describing the history, methods, and materials of The Centennial State Electrigram Company. The books are an exploration into philosophical concepts: simulations, historical perception, the extensions of man, basic reflections of reality, perversions of reality, pretenses of reality, and simulacra. I like to play off history, interweave fiction and fact, extracting dubious subplots from the familiar master narrative. I think of e·lec·tri·gram as a sort of slice of a distorted reality.

The photographic books are filled with illustrative imagery that explore relationships to history, materials, and methods. Using my pack rat collection of ephemera I assemble codes and keys to my written narrative, embellishing photographically what is conveyed in text. I don’t discount the creative power of digital devices and I maintain interest in traditional and alternative process photographic work. I work with pen pals, sending them small pieces I call Electrigrams. If I can make work traveling only by bicycle, I am most happy. I still haven’t decided if most machines are essential or detrimental human extensions.

I am currently exploring the freshly coined “New Aesthetic” utilizing creative code, glitch, databending, and other new media approaches to create narratives through imagery and text. I am combining this new approach with my ongoing Centennial State Electrigram Company project—my corporate alter ego. Electrigrams started as the most elaborate mixed media compositions that can fit into an envelope and be mailed via the United States Postal Service and became a mother for other visual explorations.

Electrigram works are often personal correspondence between friends and other collaborators across the United States and throughout the globe. The idea behind Electrigram Company work is to explore, strengthen, and promote interpersonal relationships through an exchange of writing and imagery. I believe the delay created by the physical shipment of the work gives collaborators time to live their lives and react in slower more thoughtful ways as opposed to using the quick-paced, digital conveyances that are so ubiquitous today.