Erika 1998-2013

For 15 years - from 1998 to 2013 I photographed my friend Erika. The images depict her in various stages of personal evolution - from her years as a struggling artist, through her founding of an avant-garde theater company, marriage, divorce and single motherhood. Erika tells her own story on the back of each 8x10. In 2020 I created a handmade box of these photographs with text from three interviews I made of her printed on the back of each image. There are 30 prints in all. Erika tells her own story.

The project is intended not as a book, but as a - sort of coffee table objet d’art. The prints are loose, meant to be handled and turned over, each inscribed with Erika’s insights into those rocky but exciting first ten years post college in rapidly changing New York. On the back of one print she says:

"I had just gotten divorced. I had to let go of that beautiful and cheap loft. It was a rough time, but I had to find a room of my own. I ended up renting a room in a big mansion in Crown Heights. It was a lonely, isolating transition. In breakups I always seem to be the one getting rid of all our things. In this room the bed - all the furniture - was not mine. All I had was my mirror and clothes. I called it my room, but I wasn’t allowed to move anything in the house. Everything had to stay exactly where it was.”

The Erika box is a long term investigation of dreaming, risk-taking, loving, motherhood and survival. The project is dear to my heart as it is an exploration of our friendship, creative ideas and our yearly dance with light and shadow.

My hope is that a handful of people bring this box into their home and leave it out for others to enjoy - perhaps as a curious box of family pictures of a distant relative who chose a different path in life. An essay is included, extending my intimate thoughts about the project.