Poignant Portfolio no. 26: Peggy Washburn
Precisely Now by Peggy Washburn
All things happen, happen to one, precisely now. Century follows century, and things happen only in the present. There are countless men in the air, on land and at sea, and all that really happens happens to me.
-Jorge Luis Borges, The Garden of Forking Paths
In my first-grade class, I was taught to write with my right hand. I was more comfortable with my left. We had big sheets of paper and were asked to make lines, then circles using our whole arm. I made hundreds, maybe thousands of circles. I pasted these circles, along with found objects into books. It helped me to record my thoughts and make visual order. It also allowed me to express the familiar disorder of a child’s mind. I later added drawings and eventually my photographs. My first camera was a 1973 Polaroid Land Camera. I began shooting at night and was unable to make the rotating, disposable flash cubes sync with my shutter, so the images were blurry. I remember thinking if I could just hold still I’d make better pictures. I began shooting again in the early nineties and became enchanted with the darkroom. I loved the meticulous routine and rules, which could later, with respect, be broken. I still combine images. It satisfies an evolved compulsion to arrange random events into a narrative; to bring past into present while exploring an imagined world inside of one that exists. I now believe that the balance and order I’ve been seeking exists in the form of time. It’s filled with anguish, beauty, excitement, and boredom. It looks like splendor, torment, is rational and messy. It can be generous and deceptive, unreasonable yet grounded. It’s sometimes unavailable. We’re given the time we have to live the lives we value. These are my records and a brief glimpse into what has passed.
Peggy Washburn is an interdisciplinary artist and educator who uses photo-based mixed media to examine ideas pertaining to balance, order, disorder and time. Her work has been acquired by permanent collections including the Bibliotéque Nationale de France, The Harry Ransom Center, Museo Nazionale della Fotografia, de Brescia Italy and The Ralph Lauren Collection. Along with numerous gallery shows her work has been exhibited at The Frye Art Museum, The Seattle Art Museum, The Whatcom Museum of History and Art, and Aperture NYC. Currently working on both the East and West coasts, she serves on the Academic Advisory Board for University of Washington’s Certificate in Photography and lives in Philadelphia where she runs and after-school photography program for at-risk youth.
IG: @peggy_washburn
From the Editor
Hello readers, we recently published Wasburn’s work in our Diffusion X annual, and honestly, I would have loved to print more of her work in the issue so I was thrilled when she submitted for a Poignant Portfolio feature. I’m so very drawn in by the representation of the artistic process in this series and the layering in of personal history. When looking at work I typically forgo reading artist or project statements and just dive into the art. So when we chose some of this work to be published in Diffusion is was less about the artist’s intent and more about the visual impact of the individual pieces. Ironically, in this Poignant Portfolio feature, I’ve led with the artist’s statement, but even then the content’s message is still fragmented. Washburn leaves the narrative cryptic enough in the work that the content can be left to the imagination of the viewer. What I can glean from the combination of images and general aesthetic is the impression of the passage of time and the process of creativity. Ultimately Precisely Now presents itself like visual poetry; romantic, dark, and beautiful.
–Blue Mitchell @onetwelveprojects