A Light Year of Lead, Bethel University, 2019
For the past five years, I’ve traveled to underground laboratories and astronomical observatories in order to find out exactly what we don’t know. In A Light Year of Lead, my findings are presented via large scale color photographs, video, and installation. Pivoting away from scientific facts and clarity, I focus my lens on mystery, magic, and absurdity while simultaneously working as a documentary photographer. The resulting work oscillates between scientific objectivity and human subjectivity, the massive and the massless, extraordinarily sophisticated experiments and dumb luck, leaving the viewer in a state of wonder, confusion, and curiosity.
At the center of the exhibition is Bubble & Swallow, a short film that documents swallows flying around an obsolete particle detector in which I painstakingly traced each frame of the film. Installed on the floor is 7x6x30, a gridded installation of scientific sticky-mats, a tool more often found in laboratories than galleries. The result is a wonderfully uncomfortable sonic and sensorial experience—like walking on wet paint or flypaper. Throughout the exhibition I simultaneously collected and created evidence, but leave it to the audience to figure out the questions I’m asking.