In the late summer of 2009, a severe depression took over my existence with no respite in sight. Neither medications nor well meaning friends and family could pull me up out of a growing world of darkness. There was only one place that I could go and find relief from the familiar abyss. There, sheer cliffs perched on the edge of the Pacific Ocean provided a natural refuge where I could lose myself, awed by the immense views and my feeling of insignifance next to them.
"Grounded" is the culmination of that time and the impulses that brought me there. I began to revisit the way in which we inhabit the space at the boundaries of land, sea and sky. I kept returning to certain images that felt like a balance between the unease and the peace I felt during the hours I spent at the edge of the ocean. The figures in these compositions represent less the individuals in the pictures but an unexplained attraction to the edges of our environment. We all seem drawn to a seashore, the crest of a tall hill, or even the sky, dangerously out of reach. When I find myself in these places, a sense of my own small place within the environment could easily elicit a sense of fear and unease, yet, inexplicably I find a peace not often found in the places over which I control.
Kerry Mansfield is a San Francisco based photographer whose artwork explores time and how it affects our perceptions of what we see. Her work has been exhibited globally and garnered numerous honors including LensCulture?s Single Image Award, multiple World Photography Organization and IPA Awards, and a Critical Mass Finalist multiple times. A host of press and publications, ranging from the PDN Photo Annual to the New York Times LensBlog, have featured several of her bodies of work. Her Expired series monograph was just released in fall 2017 receiving great reviews and the PX3 Bronze Award.
