November 2012
Artist’s Statement
Certain events from my past seem to dominate my thoughts and my mind returns to these memories again and again. I began to imagine what they would look like as photographs, and then I want to know how they would relate to each other as a series.
In the process, I began to understand how we create our self-identity. When placed in mental proximity to other events, suddenly a relationship is established that might not exist in linear time but might be part of some other truth. In this choosing and arranging, we construct our sense of self. As much a creative construct as any film or novel, we create ourselves as we go.
Thus the re-telling of a life strays even further into fiction. In this body of work, tableaux vivants show re-enactments of actual experiences and dreams from my life. A serial narrative, images are paired with text.
Instead of presenting them as memoir or autobiography, I’m framing real experiences as an exploration of our concepts of reality, memory and perception. The story is about telling the story.
Biography
Atlanta artist Beth Lilly’s conceptually-driven projects engage viewers in innovative ways. Her recently published book, The Oracle at WiFi, was shot entirely with a cell- phone camera. This performance project was also included in Atlanta Art Now’s book, Noplaceness, a critical discussion of the city’s visual artists. Her recent exhibitions include The New Mexico Museum of Art; The Center for Fine Art Photography in Fort Collins, Colorado; Atlanta Hartsfield International Airport; The Photographic Resource Center in Boston; Atlanta’s Hagedorn Foundation Gallery; and MOCA Georgia. She received grants from the Society for Photographic Education, Fulton and DeKalb County Arts Councils, and in 2009, was the recipient of Atlanta Celebrates Photography’s annual public art grant. Beth earned an MFA in Photography from Georgia State University and an ABJ in Journalism from the University of Georgia.
