44″ x 55″
archival inkjet canvas print
My mother left my family and the military through suicide, across the world
in an American military base stationed in Okinawa, Japan. Fifteen years later, I visited the places my mother photographed during her deployments and created my own photographs firsthand.
By using my own photography and visual language within the context of her photographs made in Okinawa, I created a new link between myself and my late mother as well as a context surrounding her absence. What is left behind are distant and mesmerizing fragments of our connection and undeniable distance. Through this presented context, I aim to make sense of the past and my mother’s photographs, while expanding upon the bond and inherent distance between family and the deceased.
Pictured is a view of an ocean current below a cliff, at Cape Hedo in Okinawa, Japan.
Edition 3 of 7.
Item is located in Bloomfield Hills, MI. Local pickup available. Domestic shipping is available for an additional fee. Contact aweisbrod@cranbrook.edu for a custom shipping quote.
Ryan Ko is a Korean American artist with a studio practice based in Arizona. He earned his BFA from Arizona State University. His work explores the concepts of memory, absence, and the bond and inherent distance between family members and the deceased. Through the integration and reimagining of familial archival images, his work is inquisitive in nature; Can we form memories with those that are already gone, and can we find them in places they have never been? Do we separate from death, discovery, and longing, or do we surrender to it?
