Recently I have been fascinated with the idea of memory and the moments and experiences that create them. My wife got a Polaroid camera for our wedding reception and we have been taking photos ever since. There is something about the Polaroid image that that is radically different from images captured on a phone or conventional digital camera. The images seem not to discriminate; they represent the moment as if you were there - in between blinks. The photos I have selected to work from are not posed but instead are candid. This candid nature endows the images with a ‘reality’ and this reality rejects and embraces a presence of truth. Truth to the moment. Truth to what the eye can see unaided by higher technologies. Truth perhaps to the way these experiences may have ‘felt’. All of this really excited me when approaching these images in paint. I chose water color on hard bristol paper to emphasize the transient and fluid nature of moments and memories. I used a wipe off technique for the lights, and loose brushwork that resembled the blurred lines of the images. The scale is small and square, echoing that of the original artifacts. The end result however, is not reproductions or copies of the originals - they are heartfelt re-interpretations of the the memories themselves. Memories are strange things, especially when thinking of their relationships with photography. Studies show we are less likely to remember things we take photographs of - yet the photographs are records of those memories to revisit later. But are they more real then? Juxtapositions like the one just discuss add to the layers of this investigation. Memory versus artifact, machine-made versus hand-made, reality versus truth.

Below is an example of the series displayed as a unit. Out of their original context they seem slightly removed from the Polaroid. Below that is a series of photographs highlighting the process and materials.

Screenshot_2019-11-04 Jared Seff ( jared_seff_art) • Instagram photos and videos.png