Los Angeles-based photographer Tracy L Chandler documents her hometown in “A Poor Sort of Memory.” Set against the Californian desert and with reference to the words of the White Queen from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland–“It’s a poor sort of memory that only works backwards”–Chandler revisits her past, not with the expectation that she will arrive at some sort of conclusive truth but, rather, with the understanding that she is venturing further down the rabbit hole:
“As I revisit old hideouts in concrete washes and private bunks in rock formations, I am reminded of a past laden with trauma and my youthful desperation to find both a sense of belonging and independence. I would escape the morbid chaos of my family home and take refuge in the periphery. Now I return to these spaces to photograph. This land is strikingly beautiful but also feels both claustrophobically familiar and alien with dis-belonging. There is ambivalence as I explore this landscape. I contend with the conflict of the seemingly objective reality before me versus the subjective truth of my memories. I find myself chasing ghosts and evading monsters. I struggle to parse memory from fantasy and reflection from projection. As I work, I embrace this unreliable narrator and use the tracings of my history to craft a new loose photographic fiction.”
Tracy L Chandler shared “A Poor Sort of Memory” with us via the Submissions section of our site. The project is currently available as a photo book published by Deadbeat Club.