ARTIST STATEMENT

I Can Hear You Humming follows a network of power lines as they travel throughout our cities and beyond, offering a view of our contemporary landscape and the metal giants that inhabit them. Standing still yet in constant motion, they are on an endless journey that symbolizes both our connected nature as a society, and our boundless need for the energy that keeps it functioning.

At first they seem out of place: giant heaps of metal and wire; yet they have somehow imbedded themselves into our visual culture and become as invisible to us as the energy that they carry. In the open, they move freely and dance through the landscape. As they approach our cities and homes, their corridors become places of recreation, residence and rejuvenation, offering temporary relief for a congested city. The sprawling power grid then becomes a symbol of modernity, leaving a signifying mark fixed on our landscape, and as such I have grown to view it as an endless modernist sculpture, often arranging itself in a way that defies its utilitarian nature. Like most things, it is easy to take for granted: visually, the power lines fade away into the distance and are easily ignored and more easily forgotten. However, at other times they arrange themselves in an iconic fashion that truly showcases the power and reliance that they represent.

The following series of photographs attempts to record this feeling of power in the landscape, capturing the scenes that I feel represent a juxtaposition of banality, necessity and splendor.


LINKS

Photos of a Modern Monolith::: Amanda Happe