Holding On
Andrew Robinson
Issue 34 Spring 2003
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These photographs are from the home of a person with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (O.C.D.). The contents of the house had been accumulated over the period of a year or more and little if anything had been thrown away during this time.
Narrow walkways led through rooms knee deep in the ephemera of a consumer culture. What might at first appear to be discarded rubbish had to be approached with the care and attention usually reserved for an archeological dig, the movement of items to place camera and lights requiring sensitive negotiation.
Slowly over the course of a number of visits I ventured deeper into the house, initially on the ground floor, then upstairs and into the bathroom. The bedroom however remained out of bounds.
The creation of this collection of artifacts, along with the owners desire to have it recorded before it's enforced clearance, seemed like an attempt to hold on to something past. A desire one can recognise in much photography, the wish to preserve; to capture a fleeting moment.
