Orbis Viridis Obscurus
These works revolve around ideas that have been slowly coalescing in my creative practice. The ideas all have something to do with the dark green world- orbis viridis obscurus. It is a world sprung by the optical mechanics of envisioning, dark journeys of historical and literary musing, and a fertile kind of isolation that approaches the sublime. They have something to do with the literal darkness of the camera obscura‘s projection space and another kind of darkness.
The camera obscura with its participational optics, the recorded visions of reconfigured landscape in unique and time-bound interiors, and the privileged point of view that undoes a visually vexing swirl of imagery- all surround and define a conceptual space that is difficult to tackle directly. It is my hope that the modest manifestations of the individual works will serve to illuminate this obscure core, perhaps in the way that Joseph Conrad suggested in Heart of Darkness: “the meaning of an episode was not inside like a kernel but outside, enveloping the tale which brought it out only as a glow brings out a haze…”
This project was completed with generous support from [NAAU] as part of the Couture ‘08 Series.