DNA: Italy
I was born in the USA, but all four of my grandparents were immigrants from Italy — my paternal grandparents entered through Ellis Island, my maternal grandparents by way of Canada before settling in the States. When I photograph in Italy, where I've been fortunate to return many times over the years, the pictures function as a kind of mirror: whatever else they show me, they are also showing me what it means to be Italian and offering some glimpse of a part of myself I didn't grow up inside of.
These photographs were made during a five-week trip through Italy, much of it spent touring by bus. I photographed constantly, often through the bus window and those images are layered with reflections — the interior of the bus, the far side of the road, the landscape I was pointing my lens toward, all occupying the same frame at once. Many of the other photographs, not made through bus windows, share a similar layering. (All of it happens in camera, in a single camera exposure; in post-processing I'm only making basic adjustments.)
What I see in these photographic “mirrors” is rarely clear. Reflection, interior and exterior blur into each other until I can't always tell which is which — an identity handed down to me rather than built firsthand. I am looking at Italy from the inside of something moving, through glass, at a remove I can't fully close. The pictures don't resolve that distance. They just show it to me clearly.
