CCBC Gallery: The Velvet Ditch
The Velvet Ditch
Photography by Lucy Bone
On view in the CCBC Gallery May 1 to June 17, 2018
Lucy Bone is a photographer from Columbus, GA. The weight of history holds an important place in Bone’s work, evident in her specialization in the antiquated medium of film and thematic influences from her life in the South. Bone’s work revels in symbolic color and reflective spaces that retain universal yet intensely personal experiences. She holds a BFA in Photography from the University of Georgia, and now resides and works in Athens.
All nine works of art on view are archival inkjet prints shot with Mamiya 7ii using 120mm Portra 400 film. View images from this series and more on the artist’s website: www.lucybone.com
Artist Statement on The Velvet Ditch:
A while ago my twin sister asked me if I was aware of the Velvet Ditch. She told me, it’s a comfortable place that is hard to crawl out of.
This stemmed from a conversation she, and a lot of people around me, have been having lately about educational, emotional, and literal growth in this period of my life neither on my own nor completely with someone else. These photographs center on memories and projections that reoccur in this time of limbo. They point towards the comfortable southern culture that I have become accustomed to, and now the reluctant need to grow out of it. The photographs depict pressures of job offers, mixed with childhood memories of pecan gatherings, and quiet moments of living alone for the first time in my life.
While trying to come to terms with needing to crawl out of this ditch I cannot help but recall the dichotomy present in the Greek myth of Arcadia, a wilderness home where imperfection is a requirement for bliss. This work brings up a similar tension – how stress, worry, and discomfort are required for the existence of accomplishment. Themes of growth pervade the series, embodied as images of job security and friends who have been blessed with it, tomato plants I see myself in, and others who find themselves in my situation.
Also saturating these images is the color green. The color of landscapes and kudzu and the other lush foliage so common in my childhood, but also the color of jealousy. Jealousy of how everyone makes growing up seem effortless, and jealousy of all who have followed the rabbits through the hole in the brush and escaped the ditch quickly and quietly. But prosperity also finds itself inside my green. The prosperity of my community, uplifting and encouraging, help me lift my head up just high enough so I can see the road that lies on the other side of the ditch.
This work belongs to worry, to phone conversations about finances, being scared of
noises in the shower, endless rewriting of cover letters and job applications, but also to a higher idea of achievement, the color green, and the Velvet Ditch that I’m lucky to have in the first place.
The works on view are archival inkjet prints shot with Mamiya 7ii using 120mm Portra 400 film. All nine prints are for sale through Creature Comforts’ online merchandise shop through Sunday, June 17, 2018. Frames are included in the prices below.
18×22” (horizontal): $250
16×20” (vertical): $175
Prints are available in varying sizes ($25–65) directly through the artist. Please email [email protected] and your inquiry will be directed to the artist.
10% of all CCBC Gallery sales go toward Get Artistic, Creature Comforts’ emerging nonprofit fund to support Georgia-based artists in any creative field (music, writing, dance, and more). Learn more at: www.getcurious.com/getartistic