Craig Hickman

Artist Statement

A series of composited photographs, Explanations and Clarifications developed out of OXIDE and other projects. It has three forms - screen based pictures, inkjet prints and a book. The pictures are part photograph and part diagram. Each has a theme which is sometimes obvious and other times not. There are several visual devices that run throughout the project, like color diagrams reminiscent of Joseph Albers Interaction of Color, and QR codes. If you read the QR codes they will they add or respond to the picture. Even the virtual tape that appears to attach the pictures to the wall sometimes becomes meaningful content.

While the background picture is always one of my photographs, the composited material comes from a variety of sources, including my own pictures, pictures from The New York Public Library Digital Collection, archive.org, and the University of Oregon collection of early 20th century textbooks. I do image restoration on historical material and composite it onto virtual notebook pages, which are then composited onto the background picture.

As with most of my projects, I would like the viewer to experience the pictures as if they discovered them while walking down the street, and to make connections to try to explain their peculiar meanings.

Craig Hickman | Eugene, OR

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