The Free Section
Collection of Images, 2018-
What originally began as an inquiry into the cost of free commodities transformed quickly into an inquiry on “non-things.” Informed by Roy Sorensen’s text Nothing (2022), this project attempts to examine the place that conditional nothings hold in the time-space of American aftermarkets.
Combing through the “Free” sections of Florida Craigslist.org sites, these images were selected on three criteria of “nothings:”
1. Non-value: found in the free sections, these listings offer “free” objects "for sale” in a market context.
2. Traces: these images all offer trace evidence of their soon-to-be former owner found through shadows and reflections in each image.
3. Not Photographers: each image evidences shadowy remnants (a la Plato’s cave allegory) of their photographer. While the images are not intended to be photographic artworks, there is still a deliberate attempt to both hide the hand of the photographer, and capture the appropriate information within the frame.
At the end of the end of an objects shelf life, therein emerges it’s curb appeal; a fever dream of free objects that, like a phoenix, will have a life after their life is over.