Photography helps us see things that are normally invisible to us.  A photograph can freeze an instant, revealing the beat of a hummingbird’s wings or the look of surprise as it flashes across the face of a friend.  Cameras can detect wavelengths of light invisible to humans, opening up new worlds for exploration or amplify faint glimmers from stars so that we can see the night sky in all of its glory.

Time not as Passing, but as a Whole

Human memory is often in the form of images recollected- slices of time recalled years later- which may be why photographs and snapshots resonate so deeply.  But according to Einstein, time and space can be thought of as a continual surface where our existence is played out on a four dimensional surface.  One where past, present and future meld seamlessly.  What the heck does this have to do with art and photography?  Well, more after the jump!

I’ve been playing a lot with Mylar lately and it’s now at a point where I can share some of the work.  Mylar is different in that it moves and flexes constantly.  I played with this a bit in the opening photo.  The reflective sheeting was moving in reaction to a heat blower in the studio and a half second exposure averaged that movement into a painterly image.  In my more recent work, I have been taking advantage of some of Mylar’s other properties, such as translucence and flexibility.  I’ve done some work like this earlier (see here) but these new images combine multiple techniques.

The multiple images are call to the passing of time, while the translucence is representative of how that past is a reality only in our memories- a short coming of being three dimensional creatures.

Lucas James is a fine art photographer based in Manchester, NH.  Anisotropic Images Photography