ARTIST STATEMENT
The phrase “the earth on the back of the giant turtle” originates, in various forms, in Native American myth. In the story, the world is covered in water and an animal is asked to dive to the bottom of the primordial ocean to collect mud, in order to form the dry land on the back of the giant turtle. This story represents one of countless explanations people throughout history have formed defining the origins of Earth and the nature of the universe. Our understanding and beliefs are always dictated by our limited knowledge, by what we know or don’t know, by being born into a culture or family with a dominant mythological or scientific belief, and by living in a constant state of flux and, eventually, death. It is our perspective, beliefs, culture, religion, science that, to some of us, make this turtle story seem a bit unrealistic, just as future generations will undoubtedly dismiss some of our beliefs. The turtle story is another step in the continuously developing understanding of an ever-changing reality through science and experience, from explaining how and why the sun sets to predicting the path of a hurricane to understanding and accepting physical reality merging with virtual reality. The story represents one of the many beliefs, throughout time, of what is happening here. The work incorporates this myth with a selection of others in an attempt to form a broad story, as people throughout history have done, forming a spectrum of the various ways the unknown is explained through magic, myth, and science.

The erased photographs, nicknamed erase face, represent the protagonists of the turtle story, questioning their environment, lines coming out of them like thought bubbles in a cartoon. The lines radiate, mirroring knowledge or beliefs changing over time. These "limbo lines" connect with other people and objects in the environment, representing our dependence on and desire to understand things happening around us. They are our thoughts, questions, and ideas that lead to understanding we develop, either with variations of myths like the turtle story or through science and objectivity. The protagonists identities are hidden, representing anyone. They represent the incomplete nature of memories as well as the fragmented nature of the people and environments in the photos, that inherent motivation to understand their surroundings. The erasure hides individual identities and, most importantly, represent inevitable change and the fact that these individuals, in that specific form, no longer exist, either older or completely gone.

The turtle shell is represented both by hexagonal and triangular pyramidal shapes in the work. The triangular shapes represent the contours of the alligator snapping turtle while the hexagonal shapes indicate the shell patterns. The pyramidal mountains are often surrounded by space, one of the great unknowns, composed of constellations, the ancient order we’ve implied on space. The titles represent the manor in which we organize the world, be it science, magic, humor, mythology, experience, objectivity, or sentimentality. The VHS, like the turtle story, represent outdated things that continue to exist, bound to us by their initial value, and now wound up in habit, nostalgia, or loyalty. The movies themselves are our modern myths. Hero adventures and historic story patterns that gradually change over time. The Atari games represent these same story themes, becoming more and more interactive, the commingling of reality and virtual reality. The pixels of these early games, representing the origins of these initial primitive, digital steps. The Space Invaders especially represent these beginning steps, as well as our fascination with the end of the world scenarios, similar to credits scrolling at the end of a movie. The wallpaper patterns represent the various repeating scenarios that surround us, each wallpaper representing a specific concern. The green Osiris wallpaper represents eventual death. The Entry Hall Wallpaper, the entrance to a larger building of which we typically choose a room to live, the rooms of the belief systems we often follow. The Jellyfish Wallpaper represents the rising and falling oceans over time, the natural world elements we have little to no control over.

The main themes of the work are memories, reality, and the unknown. Memory represents a tangible awareness of the past. Events that have physical remnants and experiences that form our empirical knowledge of reality. At the same time, these memories dissolve, become idealized, fragmented, or outright forgotten. Reality represents our sense of what is true or fact and the ability for this knowledge or truth to change over time. The idea of the unknown represents events of the future, what happens next in an unpredictable reality. On a larger scale, the uncertainty surrounds general questions about being alive. The idea of people knowing their beginning and inevitable end, this awareness of a limited time alive, a fragmented, idealized, and vague memory of the past, fundamental changes in our day to day life, and complete uncertainty of the future, has branched the work into these three fundamental areas.

Who are we? Where do we come from? What happens when we and the people we know die? We live in a constant state of flux and there is a prevailing sense of uncertainty about what happens next. For some religion or mythology answers questions, others it is science and close observance of the objective, and others combine these two approaches. Whatever it is, it is necessary to gain a grasp on how to deal with the change. The world is only going to be like it is right now for a moment. What comes next? We almost always don’t know. And each of us has a different way of dealing with this. Within any belief system, the individual has their own religious or mythic interpretation. A portion of the interpretation is left with the individual and their personal beliefs/experience/knowledge, forming a conflict between the personal and the all-inclusive. And others don't answer these "truth" questions because they believe they are unable to know or rationalize a potential author or the rules of the story from within. The basic idea is we almost always don't know what comes next and eventually everyone we know, including ourselves, will die, and we're all aware of this outcome and each of us has a different way of dealing with this uncertainty.