Erasure

How much can be taken from a subject, and how much can I remove, before it stops being what it was?

I photograph things that have lost the place, purpose, or identity they once had. Man-made or natural, it makes no difference. Something is always working against them. Some resist it. Some survive it. Some fail against it. The landscape is where this happens, not what it's about.

I work in fog, snow, and deep night because these conditions actively erase what surrounds a subject. In the day, snow and fog obscure, bury, and isolate. At night, darkness takes everything. I use a handheld light to recover bits and pieces, though often parts are still pulled back into the darkness.

Sometimes the erasure is already over. What's left is an object stripped of the place, purpose, or life that once surrounded it, sometimes whole, sometimes damaged by the process itself.

Decay is often what's visible, but decay isn't what I'm after. I'm searching for the loss, absence, and lost function underneath it.

This is Erasure.

Erasure is presented in three chapters:

Erasure Day is where erasure is actively occurring — fog and snow obscuring, burying, isolating in real time.

Erasure Night is where total erasure is still being fought — darkness taking everything, a handheld light recovering what it can before the black takes it back.

Remains is what's left after erasure is complete — objects stripped of place, purpose, or life, cleansed or damaged by the process.