Just off of Barrett Parkway, among the hustle and bustle of Town Center Mall, is the resale boutique Ecologie. The store carries an eclectic mix of brightly colored blouses and charming boots. Just off to the left, in between shelves of knee-highs, is an opening into an unused section of the store where KSU students Heather Miller and Sara Hollis have their senior capstones on display. As art majors, they are required to put on a show that most closely resembles the type of work they hope to do after graduation. Heather and Sara, both photographers, collaborated by bring together their individual works to create the showcase: “Hearkening.”
Along the otherwise empty wall, the photographs of each artist depict a mood of restless tranquility. Both looked to capture a part of nature that has in one way or another seemed lost to them.
Heather’s larger prints are colorful with glimpses of a young woman on a paisley couch, misplaced in the woods. She describes her series, titled “Looking Back,” as being a “mixture of nature with the struggles of having to grow up.” With the couch and the young woman always just out of full view, Heather demonstrates a sense of insecurity. She feels becoming an adult is “much like the vulnerability I feel when exploring the woods around my home… I am pulled all too often back to reality where there is not much time or room to go out playing anymore.” Adding to the intrigue of each portrait is the contrast between the couch’s blue and pink pattern to the greens and browns of the surrounding nature. Each photograph taken from a different angle functions like a piece to an unsolved puzzle.
In smaller black frames just a few feet away, Sara’s photos take a different approach to a similar feeling. Her collection, “Forest,” combines portrait style photos of nature with antiquing techniques to bring out the “agedness and wisdom” of her subjects. Lined up like centurions for duty, each portrait is of a unique tree, some with roots tangled and reaching, others bending over rocks for a little extra sunlight. For Sara, each photo “serves as a portal into days gone by when technology and the contemporary commotion… weren’t such a distraction.” Similar to Heather, Sara sees immersion in nature as an opportunity to find nostalgia in simpler times, like childhood, or possibly even further back in time, when the forest was a normal part of life. On opening night of the show case, a patron described one photograph as reminding of her something that could have appeared in one of the “Lord of the Rings” movies. Sara really appreciated the comment, because as she put it “’Lord of the Rings’ is definitely a different universe” from where we are in today’s busy world.
Sara Hollis and Heather Miller wish to express their gratitude to Ecologie Resale & Vintage for their support of Kennesaw State University and their senior capstone project.
