ARTIST'S
STATEMENT: Birthe Piontek
"Individuation is a recurring theme
in my photographic work: the ways people struggle to belong
yet be different at the same time. Sometimes, people’s
quests for identity lead them to leave the beaten path. For
them, the quest for self-discovery becomes a journey in every
sense of the word.
The fast-paced, anonymous life of the urban environment sometimes
offers neither the time nor space for individualization, nor
the comforting place needed for belonging. So, for some, the
sense of freedom and interdependence intrinsic to a remote,
Northern community makes it an idealized symbol of the Promised
Land.
The idealization of the North has been nourished by stories
by Jack London and Robert Service; by numerous movies about
the area’s wild and pristine tapestry; and even by images
of the Northern lights, which to this day, although certainly
explicable by science, have lost none of their spiritual fascination
or magical appeal.
In 2008, I spent three months in a small community in Canada’s
Yukon, where I experienced first hand the mystery and fascination
of life above the 60th parallel, and met people who came here
as part of their quest for the idea of North.
I’m not the first observer to be simultaneously intrigued,
yet remain a visitor. Glenn Gould, whose work inspired the
title, wrote after visiting the North briefly, "I've
read about it, written about it, and even pulled up my parka
once and gone there. Yet like all but a few Canadians I've
had no real experience of the North. I've remained, of necessity,
an outsider. And the North remained for me, a convenient place
to dream about, spin tales about,” and in the end, return
South."
|
