Photo+: In your series “Earthly Matters” many images are combined in each work. Did you take all the photos yourself?
KD: Yes, some of these images have as many as four or five layers of photos, all of which I took myself.
Photo+: When I first saw your project, I mistook it for abstract painting. Your project seems to straddle the boundary between painting and photography. What do you think of this opinion?
KD: My work is most often a combination of photography and collage - though sometimes it also includes actual painting - as in my two series “More Than Meets the Eye” and “Not at First Glance”. In my “Syncopated Spaces” series I used small pieces of my photos like mosaic tiles. But you are right, the digitally created works in “Glimpses”, though still not abstract, are indeed my least realistic works to date.
Photo+: What message is there in this project?
KD: These images, for the most part, address the current state of Earth’s eco-system and the plants, animals and humans living in it.
Photo+: Where did get you inspiration for this project?
KD: My digital works were inspired by what was for me a new way of creating collage. Working with my images in Photoshop gave me a great sense of surprise and discovery. The ability to work so quickly - with the possibility of retracing my steps in order to explore a different option - allowed me a heightened sense of spontaneity.
Photo+: When you start a project, have you a specific concept in mind?
KD: Often my new projects take me by surprise. I will find myself seriously interested in something I thought I was doing just for fun, or find a planned project unexpectedly turning into something else entirely.
Photo+: In other projects you used the method of deconstruction and reconstruction. In this project you used Photoshop to create images. Have you a reason for this?
KD: Working with my images digitally - synthesizing them through multiple layerings and perforations - was a revelation. It has changed the way I envision pictorial space. I no longer feel that I am just warping space and time from my own perspective, but that I can approach a particular point from any number of directions.