Project|Capture is a series of painting based on photos that people
have taken of themselves and placed on the internet. Their existence
in cyber-space is fleeting - they often disappear after a week or less
- and the paintings reflect the fact that they are several generations
removed from the original subject. There is life inside the monitor
and yet it is untouchable and unknowable, gone before you know
it, a strange combination of intimacy and separation.
Early in the history of photography, Native Americans believed that
photographs (or any likeness of a person) could steal their soul, capturing
it inside the object that holds their likeness. Some believed in a personal
guardian spirit who must be treated with respect and kept private, and
who therefore must remain unphotographed. The difference between private
life and public life was very clear for them. For us, things are not
so well defined.
Project|Capture deals in
this way with the disappearing realm of the private in modern life.
