In 1933 my paternal grandmother traveled by car along US Highway Route 14 from Ft. Pierre, South Dakota to the Chicago World Fair. I grew up hearing her stories about this epic journey and the wonders she saw both on the road trip and at the Century of Progress International Exhibition. Her stories sparked my love of road trips and the human-made wonders we see on our daily commutes or longer journeys.
Over the course of my long life, I’ve born witness to the slow fading away of these roadside icons of the twentieth century, through neglect, decay, abandonment, and destruction as they surrender ground to soulless, suburban housing developments, big box stores, and mass-produced urban landscapes. Set against the relentless destruction of our planet’s health, I often feel frustrated, powerless, and heartbroken that there is nothing to be done to slow the pace of these losses. To me the old signs, abandoned cars, buildings, and landmarks seem a continuous thread, weaving together the experiences and memories of the generations. These roadside ghosts stand sentry and have observed our lives, our special moments, our histories, in essence, they hold our history. I want these ghosts to continue to be the keepers of the memories of my grandparents, parents, myself, my child, and my grandchildren.
So, I do what I can, I use my camera to document their existence and use my arsenal of artist skills and tools; composition, color, form, line, light, shadow, and texture, to give them new life in my artwork. I fight back against their neglect by accentuating their fading beauty in my art and resist their aging decay by giving them bursts of color and drama with light and shadow. I add textures and faded edges to evoke the way we embellish our memories that tend to fade at the edges of our minds. Through my photographs, I restore their beauty as a way to spread hope that we too, could collectively come together, and use our human creativity and collective love for our ancestors and children to resurrect, restore, and breathe new life into our own neglected and decaying environments.
