Quietus

Death is so open for interpretation. We chose surrealism as a way to define our imagery style and to guide us through our exploration of our inevitable demise. The series of images are meant provide an intense feeling of mystery and solitude, while at the same time, gaining a perspective on what we know so little about. We wanted to capture, in each photograph, a sense of what it feels like to think of death, and to confront the eerie reality of a ghost-like presence. Most imagery was shot with a long exposure or multiple exposures. The reason is that it gives off this ghost-like aesthetic, which makes our shots more haunting and mysterious. This allows the viewer to submerge themselves into the images and to search for clues or answers. This way of shooting also provides these images with a soft figure, in contrast to a very detailed and crisp environment around them. The location is very unique and abandoned, and we wanted to capture that as well. The images are colorized with a red tint, in order to enhance the death-like aspect, and also to boast that this was shot with film, and is therefore homage to darkroom lighting. We each had our own reason as to why we wanted to pursue the topic we chose. Lisa was added to our group to combine two themes, surrealism and death. This concept was very personal to her, after losing three people from her immediate family just in the span of three years. As her family became so familiar with this topic, it drove her to explore it further. Going into this project, our motivation was derived from the chance to get creative and to use collaboration to make more complex/interesting photos. We were also able to get access to an amazing location, which was unlike anything we have seen before. Eric Soderberg, Jordan Zinda, Alison Peluso, and Lisa Bormann Photo #1 & #3 were on Display at the Duluth Art Institute February 23rd - April 1st, 2017