i have begun working at david maisel studios this past january ’10.  david is one of the pre-eminent photographers working today, and it’s been an invaluable experience working with him so far.

david’s project, library of dust, is on exhibit at the von lintel gallery in nyc [01.21 - 02.27] and the new yorker has featured a review:

“…the subjects of maisel’s enormous new color photographs appear to be corroded tin cans, shot against pitch-black backdrops and lit like precious objects. they are, in fact, copper canisters containing the cremated remains of patients from an oregon mental hospital…
read more from the new yorker.

library of dust depicts individual copper canisters, each containing the cremated remains of patient from a state-run psychiatric hospital. the patients died at the hospital between 1883 (the year the facility opened, when it was called the oregon state insane asylum) and the 1970’s; their bodies have remained unclaimed by their families.