Scanner Obscura

Scanner Obscura is an exploration, both in its technical creation and in its content. In the simplest technical terms, a scanner is my camera. I use a flatbed scanner, approximately 9×12 inches, to “photograph” sections of the body and three-dimensional objects. I then digitally construct my segments into one image, juxtaposing the form of the body with the form of metaphorical objects. What started as a way to deal with a tragic event in my life has since become an ongoing personal journal. I turned to this way of working when my mother suffered through a stroke, brain hemorrhage, and subsequent brain surgery. As a photographer, this one event entirely changed my way of seeing. I transitioned from observer (with a traditional film camera) to active participant and subject in my work. The outside world took second stage when events within my own life became overwhelming. In the tradition of self-portraiture, I turned the “lens” onto my own life. Only in my case, the “lens” is the glass surface of a flatbed scanner. Limited to the small space of the scanner surface, I work quietly, naked, and in the dark… scanning pieces of myself and exploring the relationship of these pieces to each other and to objects. Although the darkness is technically required for the black background of my imagery, it allows for introspection and thought about each piece. I see the black background of my images like water, my body rising through. Through my scanner, I have recorded the journey through some of the milestones of a woman’s life: youth, relationships, marriage, pregnancy, and motherhood. These universal experiences, and the emotions associated with them, are explored over and over in my work, through the personal space of my body, and the metaphors that I find in particular objects. The objects that are used in my work are carefully chosen, both for their visual and metaphorical qualities. Through these object metaphors, it is my hope that viewers will decipher my visual language and find ideas that they can, in turn, relate to their own lives.