Desperation

Photographs & Video (2021-22)

Exhibition photo from AFFINITIES, Emily Carr University of Art + Design, July 2022

I walked out the phrase “quiet desperation” as a way of exorcising Thoreau’s phrase. It was an association with the land that I kept thinking about but was also uncomfortable with including him in my work. A few months later I was walking in this same field and noticed that the land and seasons had edited the text. A wave of warm weather in the late winter melted away the snow and only the word “desperation” remained. This was the land repurposing the text, refining it through seasonal time in order to say something that was not only more accurate to the present moment, but also erasing the cultural and historical baggage that came along with these words.