Artist’s Statement:
In my memory, place has always been fuzzy and unreliable. Because I moved around so much as a child, and because of trauma-induced memory complications, I’ve always found it difficult to remember exactly what happened when and where. When I moved back home after four years away, I found myself constantly triggered when I saw places from my past, even if I wasn’t exactly sure what memories they held. This essay began as an exercise for me to map out and document what I remembered from each place that seemed to elicit an emotional response in me. As this essay developed, I wanted to find a way to take the reader alongside me, as if we were driving around together, and I were to point out the window and tell you about all of these places I once inhabited. The Places I Haunt shows my process of moving back home and learning to live among ghosts, having the memories of my past and my present begin to intertwine.
