Chapter 8: The Belongings
The white cardboard box stood packed away high on a closet shelf for over twenty-five years. Packed by our mother, it contains all that remains of my deceased older brother’s life: letters, photographs, medals, important papers and small random objects he owned. It is from this box that I found the necessary information and presentation of clues to my brother’s past. It was from this box that I created much of the work for My Brother’s War.
Using these materials allows me to overcome some of the obstacles I face in the process of creating work about a subject that no longer exists. I found names and phone numbers of his comrades and friends here, I discovered written messages left for him on random pages in a dictionary that led me to discover Gary had fallen in love and planned to marry.
What I found in this box led me on a path of much discovery and faraway travel to learn about about a brother I never really came to know in life.
By incorporating Gary’s photographs and letters into my own imagery, I am able to recreate the imagined reality from wartime and the aftermath of war, in the form of photographs that tell his story.
Work from this series is available for purchase, licensing, and exhibition.
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