For the last ten years I have been experimenting with 19th century photography. Thereafter, a collection of old family photographs performed with the same medium, were discovered. I then start considering the concept of memory. Thus, the following works are not a documentation of my past.
There are many serendipitous connections between the old family photographs and my original photographs. Some of the photographs I have made of my close family, carried out with the wet plate collodion process, almost resemble particular scenes found in these old photographs.
In addition to my contemporary wet plate originals, I have also chosen to add images I took with 35mm film in the area where the old photographs were taken. The addition of a more modern approach helps to illustrate the different layers of memory represented in this work.
Mother, sister, grandmother, great aunt, great grandmother. The women of this family who became symbols of the past, the present and the future. Their portraits, old and new, are a constant reminder of a feeling of something distant and nostalgic.
I have chosen to present these works and individual diptychs and tryptics to emphasise a duality of vision, of a split nationality, of divided families and of the past and the present.
I draw upon feelings of loss, abandonment and fragments of roads which lead to new lands and new horizons. These common themes in a society that feels broken, unable to see a future as the past seems obscure and distant.