David M Frazier

Artist Statement

I had a conversation while camping with a good friend a few weeks ago, over cheap beer and a few cigarettes, about how neither of us were ever taught how to mourn the loss of a friend who is still living. I think it’s an experience a lot of us have had and nearly none of us were equipped to process it.

A while back, I posed the question “what do I do with all of these portraits of people who are no longer in my life?” to Instagram. The answer, from a follower, was short and simple: “be petty. Blot them out”.

The core concept stuck with me. Not the pettiness aspect, but what the visible and intentional removal of a subject in a photograph symbolizes. You see it in the work of artists like Angela Deane, who paints ghosts over the original subjects in vintage photographs (as seen on the cover of Phoebe Bridgers’ debut album) and Geloy Concepcion, who masks the subjects in his work to symbolize loss of relationships, both externally and with one’s self. It’s loss. It’s mourning. It’s remembrance.

This series has been in my back pocket for a few years, and I think I’m in a place mentally and emotionally to engage it.

It’s a work in progress. We all are.

David M Frazier | Portland, OR