Project Statement:
Mi Familia explores the complexities, vulnerabilities, and joys of motherhood and familial life. Joyous, and at times melancholic, these photographs explore fleeting and important moments, as well as the detritus of childhood—images that wouldn’t normally be included in a family photo album.
The series also explore kinesthetic experiences that tie us to place: the anticipation of losing one’s first tooth or the warmth of summer rays on one’s skin—experiences that are rooted in childhood and yet are often dormant in adulthood. The work pays tribute to the astute ways that children observe and see the world, and explores how parents mark the passage of time, as framed by family rituals and seasonal changes. The series seeks to create empathy, elicit nostalgia, and honor the sanctity of childhood through the creation of moments filled with the magic of play, which is often enveloped in the natural world.
Artist Bio:
Megan Jacobs is an artist based in New Mexico. Her work explores delicate relationships: our existence as material and concept, the interweaving of two partners in love, and the bond of parent and child. The materials that she works with—photographs, video projections, time-based media, glass and ice—function metaphorically to illustrate the ambiguity of the body and the mutability of memory and identity.
Jacobs’ work has been exhibited nationally and internationally and has been part of exhibitions at Saatchi Gallery (online), the Museum of New Art (MONA), the Pingyao International Photography Festival in Pingyao, China; the GoEun Museum of Photography in Busan, South Korea; the Unitec Institute of Technology in Auckland, New Zealand; and the International Symposium on Electronic Art (ISEA). She earned an MFA in photography from the University of New Mexico and a BA from Smith College.
