Title of Work
Description of Work
Clay handprints on a canyon wall in southern Utah, found after the people who made them had gone. The Navajo sandstone of the canyon wall dates to the Jurassic period, with a record of eons revealed by the water that carved the canyon away. People love to leave their mark on places that make marks on them: some of the earliest recorded graffiti in Pompeii simply read "Gaius was here." I enjoyed stumbling upon the hand prints which allowed me into the hikers' experience, and their joy could add to the lasting impression that place made upon me. Our experiences are written within our memories and in our physiology, and I took this image during an intensely healing time when the desert of Utah was helping me to internally uncoil from stress. The sediments of experience I laid down during this time have become a distinct layer within my own history, and the lingering effects of my time in the desert continue to fortify me against the challenges I have encountered after; hence this image marks a discrete episode within my own historia habitus.
Recommended Citation
Rempel, Jess W.
(2019)
"Clay and Stone,"
Akesis: Vol. 5:
Iss.
1, Article 5.
Available at:
https://dune.une.edu/akesis/vol5/iss1/5