2009

In this, my most recent - and still ongoing- body of work, Black Sun (The Art of Dying), the themes of death, mortality and consciousness are revisited. Negative sandwiching, inscription of scratches are recurrent throughout the work. The particular sequencing of images encourage a conversation between the landscape and portrait.

The concepts of death and the afterlife, as well as the stages in between, form the nucleus of inspiration for the series; in particular the ideas outlined in the funerary texts of Eastern cultures (referred to by the West as the book of the Dead) such as the ancient Egyptians' The Book of Coming and Tibet's Bardo Thodol

The Black Sun is the hypothetical center of all the star systems, center of all creation, the darkness from which all creation arose. The myth is bound up with the star system of Sirius, and with all the associations with death, resurrection and reincarnation. These beliefs have also influenced Western magic traditions and held great influence during the Renaissance. There is a persistent belief in alchemical and hermetic tradition in the existence of two suns: Heraclitus (6th century B.C) refers to them as the holy or artistic fire.

It is here that the mythology is linked to the 20 photographs in the series. Used to guide a person through the moments of death, it is said that it helps one recognize the nature of the mind and how to attain liberation. It teaches that awareness - once liberated from the physical body - creates its own reality; created to represent the seemingly fuzzy subconscious. According to traditions, this 'dream projection' unfolds in unpredictable ways, both frightening and beautiful.