Framed

MFA Alumni

Major: Photography

Graduation Year: 2021

Artist Statement:

The camera arrests time. In the stillness of some photographic images, a full contemplation of place is available. Adam Powers uses the camera to capture and represent everyday places, magnified by the abundance of evidentiary detail. The ordinary and the overlooked are always connected to a narrative elevated beyond its superficial utility, but Powers employs the arrested moment captured by the camera to access this greater narrative inherent in all things.
Photography to Powers is a celebration of technical proficiency directed towards both external and internal subject matter. The external are urban landscapes of dumpsters, shopping carts, found garbage, and admiring glances at overlooked corners that become glamorized by the camera; finding the presence of aesthetic pleasure in subjectively discounted places. The internal deals with autobiographical narratives of multigenerational curation and documentation within the home; exploring the inevitability of time and the malleability of memory.