Sherry Insley Statement

My current work is a rumination on time, using mixed media and light sensitive materials in an attempt to document impermanence and memory. I am interested in the physical nature of photography’s relationship to time, and this inquiry consists of several bodies of work that address this concept. The Ebb series asks what does it mean to use a tool that documents and preserves, to create images that intentionally disappear? Lumen printing, a historic alternative printing process, is ephemeral in nature and the image will degrade over time. Conversely, in the Ghost Forest series, the images persist in reproduction, while the subjects continue to deteriorate into near disappearance. Can experiences and perceptions become fabrications or by products of photography? Threshold and Untethered further examine these questions by playing with the viewer's sensory response to the images and sound. Photographic images can serve as witness and documents of record, as well as manipulate and influence time. My interests lie in photography’s attempt to order time and preserve memory. In an age where virtually every action and event is recorded and archived, I am intrigued with slowing down and examining this process. These bodies of work include large scale black and white digital photography, video and sound installation, and historic photographic processes.

Specific Projects

The Ghost Forest series is an ongoing photographic documentation begun in the summer of 2022. Depicting the emergence of ghost forests along the mid-Atlantic coasts, particularly in the DelMarVa area. When salt water is pushed inland into freshwater ecosystems due to storms, rising sea level, and climate change, the salinity of the soil becomes too high. The Atlantic White Cedar is particularly susceptible to the high salinity, and is the first species to die. The skeletal white trunks standing against lush landscape are sounding the alarm of a changing climate. This stark contrast is both beautiful and disconcerting, creating visual and literal gaps in the density of the forest. 

 My work with historical alternative processes such as lumen printing and anthotypes, further examines the relationship of photographic images with time and impermanence. The prints cannot be fixed with traditional darkroom chemistry, which is decidedly not environmentally friendly, and will fade away in ambient light. In the Ebb project, I collect seaweed, plant material, and found objects from the areas near ghost forests. I contact print onto photographic paper leaving the translucent silhouettes, and attempt to stabilize the images with saltwater. Here salt water is an agent of preservation rather than destruction. 

The Threshold series captures temperature inversions over the ocean that create a sense of being unmoored due to the obscured horizon. It is an absence of footing, and a feeling of disorientation. This atmospheric phenomenon and feeling of uncertainty are temporary, as the horizon vanishes and then reappears. Untethered is a sound and image installation in collaboration with musician Mitch Maltese. Here, I am revisiting images from Threshold, and replacing the disappearing visual information with sound. Using low frequencies, reverberations and higher pitched tones, I aim to influence the viewer's sensory response to the images.