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I Imagine Yes Is The Only Living Thing

byClaire Oring & Amanda Charchiantext byMarius Troy

It is pretty much exactly one year ago since we featured the talented Los Angeles artist Claire Oring with her mysterious Conjure story. Today she is back with another breath taking piece of art. Created in collaboration with model and fellow artist Amanda Charchian, the series is based on E.E. Cummings famous quote “I Imagine Yes Is The Only Living Thing.” We caught up with the two artists, and asked them a few questions about the series:

Could you describe the story and how it links up with E.E. Cummings’ famous quote?
The series uses photography as a means of communicating between spiritual/invisible world and the material/temporal world. By using the quote, “I Imaging Yes Is The Only Living Thing” by E.E. Cummings, we explored the passage between these realms in the tradition of late 19th century spirit photography. There is a photograph for each word of the sentence that is meant to use the macabre to transcend beyond physical reality. Each image functions as an imprint of a disembodied soul.

Other than the quote, what else inspired the project?
We were inspired by the use of ectoplasm in spirit photography which is the material which appears while in a trance state. It allows a spirit to interact with the physical world.

Co-creator Amanda as well to great success, how was it photographing your partner?
Well she kept disappearing because she is a ghost! Haha! But in seriousness, Amanda was the model/actress in the series as a conceptual choice. The term “YES” is a frequent point of philosophical investigation in her work so we thought it was important to have her in the photos as opposed to hiring someone who didn’t have a connection with the words.

Have you guys worked together before?
We have always admired each other’s work and this is our first collaboration. We both shoot exclusively with film for our fine art work and really enjoy experimentation so it was a great fit.