Katherine Holle – Earth and Stone: What Remains

24 April – 22 May 2016

The passage of time and our place in it is slowly being lost in the Internet age where time is overwhelmingly perceived as the present. “Earth and Stone: What Remains” is an effort to document various Greek, Syriac, Seljuk and Kurdish structures in Anatolia that convey the passing of time and cultures. It asks the viewer to place oneself on the continuum of time and reflect on the intrinsic value of what remains.

Holle’s selection of what to document has been to a degree idiosyncratic; depending on interests and constraints. In 1978, having completed graduate school, she sold most of her belongings, bought a fully manual 35 mm camera and came to Turkey. Between 1978 and 1981 she lived in Tarsus and began teaching herself photography. In those days she traveled exclusively by bus or minibus around central and eastern Turkey. Since then she has lived off and on in Turkey sometimes staying months, other times years.

All the photographs in this exhibit were taken with a 35 mm camera. Holle developed the negatives and toned the gelatine silver prints with copper brown and selenium toner. No two photographs tone the same despite preceding steps being identical. Each photograph is unique. She chose a small format similar to the 19th century postcards of archeological sites which often inspired travel to remote areas.