only salt remains, 2014

“...salt is the mineral substance or objective ground of personal experience making experience possible. No salt, no experiencing—merely a running on and running through of events without psychic body. Thus salt makes events sensed and felt, giving us each a sense of the personal—my tears, my sweat and blood, my taste and value.”

James Hillman, Salt and the Alchemical Soul

Salt is present at all levels of human experience from the most fundamental of bodily processes (i.e. tears, sweat and blood) to metaphors of language and emotion (e.g. “take it with a grain of salt”, “the salt of the earth”). My work explores how salt as a material can bridge literal and metaphoric narratives and through its physical residue, provide a ground for contemplating human experiences, both personal and communal. The salt accumulates over time creating solid and seemingly strong formations, but these will disintegrate and disperse, much like the swell of experience and emotion over time.

The work in only salt remains is the culmination of my time in the Book Arts/Printmaking MFA program at the University of the Arts and specifically investigates how salt can function as a physical metaphor for sorrow and impending loss. I draw on a narrative from my personal history to explore these specific emotions, and use the accumulation of salt to parallel the accumulation of these emotions. This mixture of sorrow and anticipation for an impending loss creates a delicate emotional state, which is suggested by the delicate accumulation of salt crystals. This work does not allude to an end in the process, but only considers the growing accumulation of emotions as one nears the end of this emotional cycle.