Half-Life
My work seeks to explore the contradictions and connections of fatherhood, masculinity and the home; while prodding the cliché’s of “midlife”. Our culture makes few provisions for men to be both a domestic caretaker, while participating in culturally masculine behavior. These “potential paradoxes” are ripe with both serious and humorous imagery.
In 2004 the content of my photography changed, when my father entered the hospital due to heart trouble. Naturally this event has fostered a more personal shift in my work to questions about my own “station of life”. This change is also largely due to an influence of my young students. Mostly young and female, the content of their work largely deals with their navigation of the world as young women emerging from college in a culture mostly dominated by men. My work does strive not contradict or even challenge theirs, but is meant to act as a foil.
Since becoming a father, I have found myself enjoying to drift some where between the bridge of youth to a self-awareness of aging. This drifting has allowed me to see the beauty of domestic scenes and uncover the humor in my life. My perspective is not of the idealistic youth, beauty or one of older wisdom. It is an incongruent blend.
