Being back home has made me realize how much of my life and my story is within the house that I live in. Ever since I have been back, I started to feel less like an adult which has felt good. When I am on campus I feel a lot more independent since I am so far from home but when I am back, my parents don’t fail to make me feel like a kid again which isn’t always a bad thing. There is a magic to life when you are a little kid. Nothing feels real and you feel like you have nothing to be afraid of minus the scary staircase you hated. With every broken window there is a story and each of these pictures contribute to hidden stories within my house that shows we were here.
Sometimes you need to build a fort or eat Oreos with milk. A lot of people grow up too fast and overlook the small things that gave them joy when they were younger. I know I did when I tried to fit into my father’s shoes as a kid wishing to grow up quickly.
I really love your first photo at the top of the stairs. The space seems so big and unknown, just as it would to a little kid teetering at the top, beginning their slow descent down. I think you also embody the feeling of being a child in a house that feels so big through how the lines in the image interplay with each other. There is a slanted-ness to the way you made the photo, where the lines of the shadows, stairs, walls, and rails on the stairs align and interplay in a way that creates a feeling of tilt and imbalance. Again, I think this really captures the child’s experience in this space.
I enjoy the cohesiveness of these pictures and how both together and individually provide a sense of home. Each photograph depicts a story, that in some shape or form relates to memory. I think a lot about how places and images give us insight into memories. Like the image of the broken window, it makes me think about the story behind it, why it’s still there, and if that had any meaning. I love how you’ve highlighted this and mad memory real through these photographs.
In my opinion, the black and white photographs make them more intense which makes every photograph seem like there is a great story behind it. I love how in most of your photographs you’ve placed a butterfly or multiple butterflies which makes these images more childish but also a little mysterious. The use of butterflies reminds me of how Elsie Wright and Frances Griffith used fairies in their photographs. Additionally, I think the butterflies serve as a connection between the images almost as if the butterfly symbolizes a person who was there for each story. I also like how in some of the photographs the butterfly is easily seen while in others it is almost hiding.
Hey Lyn. I think it was a great choice to make your photographs black and white because it gives this feeling of recollecting the past. It seems like being a child was so long ago, and as we get older, childhood will look like a distant memory that most likely be remembered in black and white. I think black and white photos also make it feel like you can’t go back to that time because it has already past. I like how each photograph builds off the previous one and that the butterfly is a cohesive element throughout.