Pine Tree Ballads

Pine Tree Ballads is a poetic vision of land, family, and time. In the early 1900s, my great-grandfather settled on the coast of Maine because it resembled his homeland of Sweden. As result of his attachment to this landscape, my family has returned to Gray's Point each summer for over a century. This photographic sequence resonates with a subtext of struggle and hope that mirrors my narrative sense of self and experience in these familiar woods of childhood and adulthood. In this place, stories have arisen from the mouths of both the young and old that over time have become the essence of my family's identity and sense of history. These images construct a unique memoir weaving the magical aura of an ancient, shared, historical record with the mysterious dreams met on dark moonless nights when one does not know if their eyes are open or closed.