Where does the photographic image reside? Is it in the physical world we encounter, or does it live in the nebulous space of memory and imagination, shaped by the media we've consumed? This project investigates the location of the photographic image at the intersection of perception, memory, and cultural imprinting.
Through my visual research, I explore how images and films subconsciously shape our perception of the world. Long before becoming a photographer, I found myself drawn to specific scenes - buildings, trees, color palettes - that heightened my awareness and provoked my imagination. Revisiting these photographs years later, I noticed a recurring quality of suspense, as if they belonged to an uncanny, cinematic universe.
These images, I realized, were steeped in the residue of visual media I encountered in my formative years: a building reminiscent of a James Bond film, a forest scene from The Iron Giant. They weren’t mere photographs of the present but echoes of past visual experiences. The photographic image, in this sense, resided somewhere between memory and reality - a translation of feelings and atmospheres that media had embedded within me.
But memory is not static. It is fragmentary, intangible, and layered, often dissolving into abstractions of color, material, and emotion. This project asks whether it is possible to create new photographs from the hazy impressions left by past media. Can these reconstructed images hold the same suspense and resonance as those originally shaped by my subconscious?
In combining new works with older photographs, I attempt to externalize this interplay between memory and perception, making the internal visible. The result is a world shaped by overlapping temporalities, where present elements trigger traces of the past, and the photographic image finds its location not in a singular moment but in a complex web of time, memory, and feeling.
By examining where and how photographic images exist in our minds, my work raises questions about how consumed imagery infiltrates our memories and affects our contemporary reality. Are the choices we make, the scenes we gravitate toward, or even the people we avoid guided by subconscious echoes of past media? The photographic image, as this project suggests, exists not only on film or digital servers but in the ever-shifting landscapes of our minds, where it mingles with memory, imagination, and emotion to shape our experience of the world.