Botanical Investigations

My series, Botanical Investigations, gives a new contemporary interpretation of 17th century Dutch still life paintings. Similar to the Dutch still life paintings, I depict a diversity of natural elements such as blooming flowers, birds, insects, and reptiles with detailed and balanced compositions. The inherent decay of organic matter reminds the viewer of the evanescence of life. My large format camera hovers overhead the layers of botanical matter and life forms flattening the view creating the illusion of a painter's canvas. As a result, the imagery oscillates between abstraction and representation, as well as painting and photography. Though each organism’s color, structure and markings were not merely created for their visual beauty, I transform them into something symbolic and monumental by documenting, magnifying and abstracting an unseen hidden world of complex forms, textures and bright vibrant colors.  My photographic assemblages of organic life forms are whimsical visual narratives that explore mating, camouflage, natural selection, seduction and the inevitability of decay.