Cache by Dana Stirling

Issue 106

Cache; a.  Treasure Trove, a valuable cache which has been lost, or left unclaimed by the owner, or a place where items are stored ; b. A place for concealment and safekeeping, as of valuables ; c. An area of computer memory devoted to the high-speed retrieval of frequently used or requested data ; d. Cache Memory - a memory that is set aside as a specialized storage that is continually updated ; used to optimize data transfers between system elements with different characteristics.

My family roots back to England, but I was born in Israel. I was a child on a fence; a daughter to a migrating family. The house within culturally stayed European but outside was the Israeli controversial culture.

I always felt a misfit with my partial incomplete identity; torn apart between parents who have never blended in to the Middle Eastern culture I felt only half belonged too.

Over the years I have heard of my parent’s memories and stories. I remember hearing of snow, youth and happiness. Stories of happier days. The stories held on to the memories of time and culture that I wasn’t a part of, and portraits of family members that always remained anonymous to me and their faces where no more distinct than any other person in generic photo album. These stories were supposed to be my heritage.

As I grew up I’ve started to question photography’s function as my memory, as my family heritage. My photographic practice chains together straight and still life photography, found footage from my family history and imagery from family albums.

Using photography I've conducted an examination of my history. Due to the migration of my family from England to Israel that history discontinued, and therefore I find it hard do consider it as mine. In order to regain my history I’ve appropriated images, along with ones that I have made myself, and edited them into a book titled “cache” which is a recognition of what is hidden in photographs, coded and read through context; that photographs can unfold memories but not necessarily the same ones that were originally embedded in them.

Dana Stirling lives and works in Queens, New York.
To view more of Dana's work, please visit her website.