Abstractions of a mental state. The logic of factory-grey & desolation — a girl & her printing press, isolation. The mechanized clicking of thinking — these are objects & landscapes that exist, but no one has seen them. My logic — logic in general — crumbles & twists, formulates itself in black etching ink. My etchings are the outcome of my perception of existence — bleak & strange.
The prints are Abstractions of imagined landscapes, sometimes objects or cities, conveying some sort of resonance, or connection. They are usually bleak & lonely, yet heroic. I don’t consider my work to fall under one style. The look of the prints from 2002 to the present is very much a product of, & ongoing dialogue with, the techniques that I use. These arose from the technical limitations of creating a studio with non-traditional & non toxic methods. I am constantly experimenting & discovering new ways to put ink on paper.”
Cargo. Weighty, anonymous, masses of consumable goods. A voluminous presence that fails to fill the absence in which it is placed.
Shipping lanes. Highways. Storage yards. Gateways through which material goods in their anonymous phase leave or enter our lives; portals through space and time for Things. Solidity. Gravity. “Needs”. Painting by Dawn Revett
I see in these portals stillborn opportunities. I see what was here, before the cargo and the promises. I see a mirage of material goods preening with seductive poise. I see what cargo cannot replace. I see the potential for change.
These sites speak to me of how anonymous consumption fragments our society within itself and divides us from the environment. Stained wood reveals an absence of nature that this ingestion of goods creates. To me it is an absence that screams. Yet these goods pass as unbranded cargo through quiet ports, sleepy highways, and placid storage fields. These places stand as silent memorials to what we have sacrificed in order to achieve the cargo we so fanatically pursue. For me these are peaceful places. Like cemeteries, or morgues. Tranquil, beautiful, and tragic.
I paint the images because for me paint best conveys the beauty that I feel in the anxious desolation of these locations. With paint I can better recreate the subtle fusion of fascination and pain that I experience when standing there. I can freeze the highway’s silent roar, and touch the solitude.”
The work that I am showing here is the product of the 40 year period 1966-2006. I have always been a photographer in black and white, and I have primarily used a view camera with which I expose 4 by 5 inch sheet film. I have printed the more recent images digitally, after scanning the negatives into my computer, while photographs that precede 2004 I have printed in my darkroom.
My favorite places to work are mill towns, the edges of cities, railroad yards, and occasionally the downtown portions of cities early in the morning when the streets are clear. I sometimes photograph pieces of machinery, and I feel that many of my photographs reflect interests I have in mathematics and engineering.”
Painting by Dawn Revett
