Memory trace: after decay

The accuracy of memory is fickle. Trace Memory: after decay, is an experimental creative work that surveys the discourse of memory and interrogates how this discourse differs from the authenticity of lived experiences. The work engages digital reproductions of land by evaluating sites familiar to the artist. These sites lay outside metropolitan regions where dying light; shadow, form and texture are elements to be gleaned and resources to be used. These resources are disengaged from the original sites and they are reconditioned to form familiar patterns of recognition and sites for meaning making. In this process, memories are replicated, tested and renewed. Trace Memory: after decay, positions both photographic and projected cartographic reproductions of memories and digital histories repurposed from landscapes in New Zealand. The digital image work is projected in a large format representative of wall maps and physically realized on an architectural scale in a gallery environment. The exhibition of work at this scale offers viewers a scenario that is as inescapable as the memories from which it draws on. In achieving this, the consideration of the gallery wall as a boundary for experience and the production of a site of meaning sees the gallery space physically present in an installation that seeks to be at both overwhelming and intimate. Here the artist pursues direct engagement with the audience as a practice and site of social meaning. The importance of place and partnership provide a direct correlation to our familiarities with common physical sites and sign posting of our experiences.