I am interested in pulling slivers of the past into the present in order to examine how their function and cultural significance has changed over time. 2019 marked the fiftieth anniversary of the infamous Cuyahoga River Fire, an event that forever changed the country’s perspective on Cleveland, Ohio, the city where I grew up. This watershed event in 1969 was a call to action that led to the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency and The Clean Water Act of 1972. I spent a year on the river’s edge with my 4x5 view camera, exploring a number of contradictions in the process: the revitalization of the Cuyahoga River while the current federal government attempts to dismantle environmental protections; the city’s capacity to clean up the river while the population declines at record rates; and the inner city’s decay while private developers cherry pick the river’s edge. In order to capture the relationship between past and present, human and environment, natural and unnatural, private and public, I focused on the historic bridges that engage with the landscape and the greater Cleveland human networks. The photographs embed the bridges—which are monuments to Cleveland’s industrial past—within the context of the changing environmental, economic, and political landscape of Cleveland, the Midwest, and the country.

This work was generously supported by The Cleveland Foundation Creative Fusion Artists Residency and The Cleveland Print Room. Prints were exhibited in Cleveland, Ohio from June 18 - July 20, 2019 as part of Cuyahoga50.

2018 // 2019