Artist Statement:
Ghost Trees is an investigation of the dying bald cypress trees due to saltwater intrusion and from climate change in the lower Cape Fear River basin in Wilmington, NC. The project explores of the liminal space between what was, what is and what will be in an ever-changing world. There are countless ghost forests along the U.S. coast of the Atlantic Ocean, from Maine to Florida.
As the Ghost Trees project progressed, it became an exploration of grief and awe, loss and beauty. The trees reflected back to me my own grief related to personal losses –my mother’s relapse with addiction in her later life, her near death from a suicide attempt, and her death several years later from cancer. The project was also a deepening quest for meaning and new ways of seeing while coming to terms with a degenerative eye disorder diagnosis.
My previous work highlighted sharp focus and deep depth of field. I had tried for years to find an entry into a representation of how I see and feel the world through photography, but all attempts failed until Ghost Trees. Ghost Trees served as a portal into embracing what is and discovering new ways of making images.
Loss, memory and beauty all have the power to transform us. It is my hope that the viewer senses both the loss and beauty of these trees and becomes inspired to preserve the beauty of nature before it is lost.
All of my work is a contemporary inquiry into psychological space, place, narrative, memory, loss, longing and healing. I am curious about the ways in which outer landscapes are equivalents of the inner landscape of emotional states. Learn more about Jen.
AWARDS
Art of the Image ’19. Art in Bloom Gallery and theArtWorks. Juror Beth Handler Riebe. First Place Award Winner for “The Answer Lies Within” from the Ghost Trees project.
BOOK COVER
“Fading Echoes” image from the Ghost Trees series is featured on the cover of Readiness by Mark Cox. Readiness is a beautiful book of meditative prose poems on the joys and struggles of being human.
