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Patrick Heagney

our resident photographer, will be exhibiting two series from his newest collection.  Imaginative and creative, Patrick’s first series This Too Shall Pass is a collection of serene characters in seemingly dire situations. His Homeland series is a compelling tongue-and-cheek look at the disintegration of suburbia.

For more on Patrick and the latest article from The Atlantan on this new series, please visit Patrick’s page by clicking here.

HOMELAND SERIES

The golden age of the suburbs has come and went. And many of these iconically bland neighborhoods have entered an era of slow decline. As people move themselves and their families into cities, neighborhoods are left semi-occupied. Housing developments sit partially completed. Those living in the suburbs are increasingly without financial means to leave or were pushed out of urban centers by the influx of the better off.

The suburbs are entering a state of entropy. The characters in this series are mourning the collapse of a just-crumbling homeland. They grapple with the thought that the environment they are a product of will soon become unrecognizable.

Grief and internal turmoil are exaggerated to the point of farce. In the artist’s opinion, what is being lost is something not worthy of their anguish. The melodrama of the characters is a tongue in cheek kiss-off to the fantasy of the suburbs. More of a repetition of cultural voids than a unique homeland, this series represents the suburbs as a dying ideal rather than a physical place. As our country’s cultural composition evolves so too does the archetype of the American dream; and the classic myth of the suburbs becomes an increasingly irrelevant representation of who we are.

THIS TOO SHALL PASS SERIES

These people should be desperate, panic stricken. What we see, rather than clenched teeth and beads of sweat dripping down foreheads, are calm, serene, even blissful expressions. In the face of imminent catastrophe they are cool, dreamy, bordering euphoria.

Can we attribute obliviousness? Do they know something that we don’t? Are they looking forward to their impending demise? Or, do they possess a boundless optimism that borders on insanity?

There is no single, or simple, answer to find in these images. The internal thoughts and motivations of the characters are left up to each viewer to interpret.

For more on Patrick and the latest article from The Atlantan, please visit Patrick’s page by clicking here.