Ansen Seale: Evergreen
Artist(s):
Title:
- Evergreen
Exhibition:
Creation Year:
- 2005
Medium:
- digital slitscan photogaphy, Giclee
Size:
- 25 inches x 66 inches
Category:
Artist Statement:
The Unmanipulated Image
For the most part, photographers have applied their craft to imitation of the real world. The camera has been used to capture a frozen slice of time, arresting a single instant from its place along the flow of the timeline. Rather than suspending a single moment, my photography examines the passage of time. With the aid of a digital slitscan camera of my own invention, the horizontal axis of the image is rendered as a time exposure. A single sliver of space is imaged over an extended period of time, with moving objects inserting themselves into the data stream at different speeds and directions. The result is a mindbending swap of the dimensions of X and time. Counter to classic photography, still objects are blurred and moving bodies are rendered clearly. Some figures are elongated and have stick legs; others are stretched out, and their feet resemble skis. Shadows curve and landscapes are devoid of perspective. Instead of mirroring the world as we know it, this camera records a hidden reality. T he apparent “distortions” in the images all happen in-camera as the image is being recorded. There is no Photoshop manipulation. These “distortions” could really be described as an accurate way of seeing the passage of time, although it is unfamiliar to our traditional concept of the depiction of time and space in art. In other words, this camera is recording a reality that exists, but only we cannot see without it. I draw a link between the ephemeral nature of these fleeting image, and the elusive nature of the quantum-mechanical universe. Some scientists argue that the orbits of electrons do not exist in nature unless and until we observe them. So then, to observe is to create. Figures appear and disappear in my work like quantum particles, and uncertainty rules the day. My work reveals my admiration for and awe of the real world. Indeed the camera doesn’t lie, and truth is stranger than fiction.
