A collaboration by Paige Lee Miller (photographer, mixed-media artist), Daniel Smith (mixed-media artist), and Gabriel Bowden (designer), Archive of Rot exhibits the relationship of each artists’ work to rot: Miller through memory and the mind, Smith through the photographic process of decay, and Bowden through found textiles and the bygone lives they imply.

The artists’ work crosses over in more than just theme - it has become intertwined in the making, consuming and reproducing itself as they design for, photograph, and reprint one another. The cyclical process itself mirrors decay, each iteration warping the last. These iterations make up the Archive of Rot: layered photographs, found material, and hanging garments.

Perhaps to view rot as a definitive process (in which it has an end point) is reductive; is it not true that from rotting matter life grows? The same can be said of memory - a recollection of a hand on skin becomes a song, which becomes a whisper in a lover’s ear, which becomes a smile, captured on a roll of film - an echo in physical form. And yet, the film, and in turn the image, will rot as well; what once seemingly gave permanence to ephemerality is ultimately subject to the same decay.

To further indulge in rot, the viewer is invited to physically sift through the layered material, mirroring the act of sifting through disjointed memory. This interaction recontextualises the function of an ‘archive,’ sacrificing longevity for intimacy and stagnation for transience as the material deteriorates through touch.

Social Media Handles

@paigeleemiller @danlsmith_ @g.j.bowden

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