How does one reconcile the desire to access memory, through the active participation and connection of a stranger? 

The idea of experiencing a natural phenomenon, through verbal and physical connection with a stranger - whose uncanny presence wakes the absence and longing for a familiar one, not physically present - suggests a physical ontology of what André Bazin believes to be the photographic image. In curiosity by asking such questions, one can assume that this stranger is simply somebody whom we do not know or fail to recognize, so we encounter them as foreign objects living outside of ourselves and judge them as objective matter...no knowledge of name, identity, or history. Our physical distance and lack of connection to one another compels us to act in this way.

But when our paths cross and our commonalities collide by held eye contact, exchanges of words (both spoken and heard), and physical contact - resulting in an experience and conscious acknowledgement of the warmth that this objectified human carries over - we subconsciously activate memory and invite the embodied presence of one that used to be familiar to us in another form. Skin acts as a barrier, but is also the portal through which we feel and navigate our human experience.

The "I In Infra-Thin" is an on-going portrait series, that explores this notion of self and other through the collaborative performance of artist and strangers willing to participate. It is an attempt to draw parallels between the photographic image as object that holds memory, with the idea of skin holding memory for the image of the human body.