from underground
sarah mowery
Š 2015 by Sarah Mowery All Rights Reserved
from underground
January 1 - 10, 2015
Sarah Mowery
“Photography has something to do with death. It's a trace.� - Henri Cartier-Bresson
Chapter 1: Acheron
Hence to deep Acheron they take their way, Whose troubled eddies, thick with ooze and clay, Are whirl'd aloft, and in Cocytus lost. There Charon stands, who rules the dreary coastA sordid god: down from his hoary chin A length of beard descends, uncomb'd, unclean; His eyes, like hollow furnaces on fire; A girdle, foul with grease, binds his obscene attire. He spreads his canvas; with his pole he steers; The freights of flitting ghosts in his thin bottom bears. He look'd in years; yet in his years were seen A youthful vigor and autumnal green. An airy crowd came rushing where he stood, Which fill'd the margin of the fatal flood: Husbands and wives, boys and unmarried maids, And mighty heroes' more majestic shades, And youths, intomb'd before their fathers' eyes, With hollow groans, and shrieks, and feeble cries. Thick as the leaves in autumn strow the woods, Or fowls, by winter forc'd, forsake the floods, And wing their hasty flight to happier lands; Such, and so thick, the shiv'ring army stands, And press for passage with extended hands. Now these, now those, the surly boatman bore: The rest he drove to distance from the shore. - Virgil, The Aeneid
Chapter 2: Isolation
2. Developmental loneliness: Every one of us has an innate desire of intimacy or a need to be related to others. This need is essential for our development as a human being. Apart from this need, a higher level of need for individualism also exists which is related to knowing and developing our own real self that requires some solitude too. For optimum development, there should be a balance between the two. When a person is not able to balance these needs properly, it results in loss of meaning from their life which in turn leads to emptiness and loneliness in that person. - Sarvada Chandra Tiwari, excerpt from “Loneliness: A disease?”, Indian Journal of Psychiatry
Thus let me live, unseen, unknown; Thus unlamented let me die; Steal from the world, and not a stone Tell where I lie. - Alexander Pope, excerpt from “Ode on Solitude”
Chapter 3: Predator
“Still, there is something predatory in the act of taking a picture. To photograph people is to violate them, by seeing them as they never see themselves, by having knowledge of them they can never have; it turns people into objects that can be symbolically possessed. Just as the camera is a sublimation of the gun, to photograph someone is a sublimated murder - a soft murder, appropriate to a sad, frightened time... When we are afraid, we shoot. But when we are nostalgic, we take pictures... All photographs are memento mori... mortality, vulnerability, mutability.” - Susan Sontag, On Photography, 1977 “The creative act lasts but a brief moment, a lightning instant of give-and-take, just long enough for you to level the camera and to trap the fleeting prey in your little box.” - Henri Cartier-Bresson, 1980
Chapter 4: Charlie
“Shouting ‘Allahu akbar!’ as they fired, the men used fluent, unaccented French as they called out the names of specific employees.” ... “The witness, who refused to allow his name to be used because he feared for his safety, said the attackers were so methodical he first thought they were members of France's elite anti-terrorism forces.” ... “‘Hey! We avenged the Prophet Muhammad! We killed Charlie Hebdo,’ one of the men shouted in French, according to video shot from a nearby building.” ... “Charlie Hebdo has been repeatedly threatened for its caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad and other sketches. One cartoon, released in this week's issue and titled ‘Still No Attacks in France,’ had a caricature of a jihadi fighter saying ‘Just wait — we have until the end of January to present our New Year's wishes.’” - The Associated Press, excerpts from “12 Dead in Attack on Paris Newspaper Charlie Hebdo, Including the Editor”, Jan. 7, 2015
Chapter 5: Safety
Acknowledgments Thanks to SMU and the Engaged Learning program for making my first independent photographic project possible; to Robert Gill for instilling in me a love of photography, an understanding of the technical aspects of the art, and a respect for the human being as a subject; to Debora Hunter for inspiring me to take on this project and to persist through all my challenges, and for her invaluable insights, expertise, and advice; to my parents who support me in everything that I do; and to Mehdi Hami for keeping me safe and sane.