Issue #15, Place Submissions - Kimberly Schneider
To celebrate Issue #15, Place, we asked photographers about their notion of place and how it has impacted their work physically, mentally, and emotionally. Over the next few weeks until September 18th, we will be posting some of the wonderful responses that we’ve gotten. Stay tuned on our Instagram & Twitter at @museemagazine to see if your work makes the cut.
© Kimberly Schneider
© Kimberly Schneider
© Kimberly Schneider
Artist Statement:
I am drawn to desolate land and seascapes. For me, making images is a meditation of sorts; a search for truth. While I am intrigued by the formal qualities of the areas I photograph, there’s something about shooting in the land, and by the sea, that releases my innermost thoughts and transfers them to my photographs.
My process is a huge part of who I am as a photographer. I make all of my images on black and white film, primarily infrared. I appreciate the way that infrared film seems to turn the world inside out, as well as its unique ability to expose what the naked eye cannot see. Further, the darkroom is where I learn about the subconscious aspect of my images.
All of my photographs are essentially self-portraits; the more I print, the more I start to see the part of me that was unconsciously exposed, and that revelation is largely what my work is about.
Awakenings began in 2010, when I had the opportunity to stay at Bodie House on Wildcat Hill. Staying in Edward Weston’s former home and shooting in Carmel were life-changing moments for me. I had always dreamed of making photographs where the masters who inspired me made theirs. This ongoing body of work is the work I was always meant to make, and what all of my work thus far has led up to.
Awakenings is a direct extension from my previous work, Emergence (2007-2009), which was the first body of work I created after the heartbreaking loss of my mother. It was a very dark time, and making those images was how I got through it.
Point Lobos & Beyond began as a series of paradoxes. Darkness and light, dreams and uncertainty, conflict and accord. As the body of work continues to grow, it has become about the undercurrents, the ebb and flow that brings these opposites together, and in doing so, turns the land/seascape into an even more magical, mystical place. Each phase of this body of work, represents further insights into the work, as well as myself; there is no separation between the two.
I am currently preparing to return to Carmel, as well as some other coastal locations in California, to finish phase 2 and begin Phase 3; the later will be made primarily, if not fully, with a 4x5 camera.
View the artist's website below:
http://www.kimberlyjschneider.com
