I am fascinated with the many tools and techniques available to tell a story, and create work that often bridges collage techniques with documentary sensibilities. Taking form in photography, mixed media, and short films, these projects become inventive representations of history and memory, both imagined and real. Part investigative, part imaginative… making them becomes a process of recollection… (gathering together again what has been scattered).
I often mine thrift stores, garage sales and dumpsters to gather found paper and images. Sometimes there are inscriptions on the back of the photos (clues), but more often they come to me stripped of all identity. I work with some images repeatedly in a series, quite often they are blurred, only visible if the viewer is at a distance. Moving closer, the viewer will see more intimate layers of the work (spiderlike handwritten text, remnants of a drawing, a torn piece of wallpaper). The final pieces employ a variety of materials including raw wood, rescued paper, paint, epoxy resin, and images printed on silk and orthographic film.
Moving home to Hawaii has had a direct impact on my recent work. I’ve begun using journals and portraits from both immediate and extended families and combining these with my own photos. The work often includes references to weather, seafaring, and the natural world, alluding to a kind of personal navigation and connection to nature. To me, they are invented impressions of history and memory, …subjective essays, based on evidence.
Sally attended both UH Hilo and Hawaii Community College, before obtaining a Bachelors in Fine Arts degree from The San Francisco Art Institute in 1999. She lives on the Big Island of Hawaii with her husband, artist Keith Tallett where they grow taro and vegetables, propagate native trees, and work in their studio.