This series is from interstate 39, a road I travel on frequently. I go back to my hometown, to visit loved ones, and reminisce of my youthhood. I photographed the landscapes of interstate 39 while in my car. This created a nostalgic feeling of innocently photographing the subject matter. I felt free, while also limited. These photographs have been taken within a month, which was the same amount of time my family traveled. Within that month, I saw Illinois the weather turns from frostbite cold to as warm as Florida sun. These photographs represent the different times of my travels, the different climates and textures of the land I felt and touched. These photographs do not necessarily represent all the Midwest, but it is the road that experienced the transitional period of my youth to adulthood, and it remembers the journey I took to get there.
“Flow and Decay” was initially inspired by my early experiences with puberty at eight years old. I associated pain being external, such as falling down and scraping my knee on the sidewalk, roughhousing with my brothers, or bumping my pinkie toe on the corner of my mother’s kitchen counter. With those in mind, I never thought that pain can be inside my body. I felt the tearing and ripping of my uterus and did not know how to control it. Not only that, my body developed at a faster rate than the other girls in my class, I was the tallest, I grew breasts, and got curves. I could not handle the fast changes that were occurring and the inability to control the pain made me in a state of panic.
Now that my body is changing again, the panic I felt at eight years old came back. The only difference between now and me at eight years old is my camera. I put these fears and curiosities into photographs as a way of coping with the pain and to heal. I used warm colors that represent flesh, such as pink and red, as well as incorporating food, such as eggs, representing tearing and pain. With these photographs, I am focusing on menstruation, both internally and outside, and the symptoms
