Artist Blog

Every week an artist whose single image was published by Der Greif is given a platform in which to blog about contemporary photography.

I found this series few weeks ago and totally fell in love with the approach of the photographer. Not only the way she visualized the topic, also the content itself is very interesting. The series utilizes portraits, text pieces, layered/manipulated photographs, aerial land images as well as found objects. "Black is the Day, Black is the Night is a conceptual exploration into the many facets of human identity using notions of time, accumulation, memory and distance through personal correspondence with men serving life and death row sentences in some of the most maximum security prisons in the U.S., all of which had served between 13-26 years at point of contact. The men I wrote with spent an average of 22-1/2 hours a day in solitary cells roughly 6’x9’; not only facing their own mortality, but doing so in total isolation. I wondered how that would impact one’s notion of reality, of self-identity or of their memories outside such an environment? Did they embrace the mind of a dreamer, the mind of a thinker or succumb to their bleak environment and allow mental, physical and emotional collapse? Did their violent impulses land them in an infinite state of vulnerability? Between 2009 and 2014 we would write and share stories regarding our very different day-to-day lives. I constructed images using formulas specific to each of their described memories, age and years incarcerated. Through these formulas, their portraits became more unrecognizable and their memories became more muddled, regurgitated and fictional with the endless passing years of their sentences. Stripped of personal context and placed in solitary cells, their sense of identity, memory and time couldn’t help but mutate. Additional tangible objects such as drawings, letters and envelopes are interspersed amongst the constructed landscapes and pixelated portraits, along with objects sought out or recreated out of descriptions given. Of the seven men I originally wrote with: one was executed in 2009 and one was executed in 2012, both of which maintained their innocence throughout their sentences. Three eventually opted to move on from the project. One was released in 2010 at the age of 30, after spending 15 years in prison. One was released in 2015 from a life sentence that had been given to him at the age of 16. He had served twenty-two years in an adult super max prison, seventeen of which were spent in solitary confinement." Amy Elkins (born in Venice, California, 1979) is a photographer currently based in Greater Los Angeles. www.amyelkins.com