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 ‘Remnants Of Time’: Fragments Of The Past’


From creased up old family portraits to those candid snapshots filled with never forgotten memories. These visual fragments evoke emotions, spark recollections, and awken the narrative. 'Remnants of Time' opens a door to the archive to a world of moments, where images become remnants, remnants of a time that once was, yet still resonate within our hearts. They offer a glimpse into the lives, experiences and relationships that shaped us, whilst reflecting on the fragility of memory, the resilience of human connections, and the significance of preserving the archive and honoring personal histories. For my second-year final display, I embarked on a deeply personal project, using my late father's collection of 35mm slides to create a bridge between memory, time, and the photographic process itself. These slides, a window into the past, were scanned and then enlarged to create digital negatives, allowing me to breathe new life into his captured moments while exploring the idea of impermanence.

Using traditional darkroom methods, I developed these digital negatives, but deliberately chose not to fix the images. This decision left the photographs in a state of flux, where they would continue to change and degrade over time, reflecting the fading nature of memories and the shifting relationship we have with the past. As the prints gradually altered in appearance, they evoked a powerful sense of nostalgia—a visual representation of how our recollections evolve and distort as time moves on.

This project was an opportunity to explore the emotional layers of photography, blending the personal history embedded in my father’s slides with the unpredictable process of chemical transformation. Inspired by my fascination with the passage of time and how it shapes our perception, the display became a living, breathing entity—an ongoing conversation between past and present.

It was important to me to create something that felt both familiar and fleeting, mirroring the bittersweet experience of memory itself. By allowing the images to change, I hoped to convey the idea that nostalgia is not just about looking back, but also about embracing the inevitable transformation that comes with time.