Inner Gardens

• Photographer
  Amy Kanka Valadarsky, United States

In the summer of 2015 I will relocate from our home in Israel to
California. While this move holds the promise of many new
opportunities, it also means I have to leave behind my two grown up
sons, our house and garden I have tended for the last 10 years.
This Inner Garden series started as way of saying goodbye to my life
in Israel, as well as an attempt to create something I can take with me
across the ocean. Through the process of photographing, I realized
that these images capture more than ‘things’. They capture my very
mixed feelings towards this move. Sadness, longing, anticipation,
excitement and all the nuances in between.
In most images, I photographed seeds symbolizing the separation
between ‘mother plant’ and its ‘children’ as well as a visual depiction of
moving on to new places – a ‘stand in’ for myself.
I shot this series starting in the garden and slowly moving to the
bedroom, my goldsmith studio and my son’s room. While the seeds
may seem as the ‘main actor’, for me, it is the background that plays
the more important role. It is the background that captures the color,
movement and sometimes the outline of the things I will not be able to
take with me across the ocean - the collection of Dumas’ antique
books, the light on my son’s pillow, the afternoon light in the studio,
the sky and lemon tree seen from the window, the first light filtered
through the white bedroom curtains.
These are things I hold dear, and for the next years will only be
present as background memories. This portfolio is intensely personal,
however the feelings visualized are universal, part of our shared
human experience, therefore I hope it will resonate with others as
well.

Amy Kanka Valadarsky was born in Communist Romania and raised in Israel. After graduating as a software engineer, she worked in the Telecommunication industry and spent the next 25+ years traveling around the globe designing software solutions that address the challenges of an increasingly interconnected world. In 2014, after leaving the hi-tech world, Amy returned to her creative roots and began a career as a fine art photographer.

Amy’s work was selected as a Critical Mass 2016 finalist, as well as featured in SHOTS, Black &White Magazine, Lenscratch and exhibited in a variety of galleries and photo festivals such as PhotoLa 2016, Los Angeles Center for Photography, dnj and bG galleries in Bergamot Station, Santa Monica.

She lives with her husband and two cats in Santa Monica, California, while the rest of her family (including the dog) wait patiently for her to return to Israel.