Jamie Hahn
Artist Statement
Figure Ground Rhythm is a concept I’ve developed in my research of making lens-based media art. My photographs and videos reflect a focused study of the foliage, land and clouds in my backyard. My work has become a repetitive and performative analysis of details of these forms and the spaces between them. In figure ground rhythm I am using a camera to record specific views in a time based sequence at a particular time of day and year. As I walk through a field, the viewfinder mediates a space of interpretation and the recorded image shifts in and out of focus. Responding to the atmospheric elements, I ask questions of figure ground relationships as a challenge to perception arises. In print and book form, my work is a reflection of how time and light affect a familiar place within a landscape. I am drawn to texture, color, atmosphere, and movement as they interact with light and time to offer subtle differences. The shooting sequence of still images is directly placed into an artist book. The photographic images are not altered and relay the information as it happened in real time. I am interested in the similarities of each photograph from one page to the other and how drawing comparisons between them can become a meditation on the moment.
Artist Bio
Jamie Hahn is a lens-based media artist working in still and moving images. By utilizing the machine: the camera both in film, digital and video processing, she explores ideas of electronic meditations on time and place within a landscape. She photographs the foliage of her backyard in a performative analysis of textures and form interacting with light, tones and atmosphere. She is interested in the movement of perception amongst atmospheric tonalities- shifting attention between the details and the overall space. In these spatial relationships, she attempts to record with the camera and reveal through an image: a subtle, quiet meditation on a moment.