Summary

Creator:

Dyjak, Leah, 1981-

Abstract:

Collection comprises twenty-five 16x20 inch color inkjet prints from a body of work titled "New Beach" by artist Leah Dyjak. The images, taken by Dyjak on the Atlantic coast, show ocean and sand encroaching on and destroying human-made barriers and boundaries - roads, jetties, and groins - with people looking on, stretching out, and strolling the beaches, evoking the nature of human existence at the liminal boundaries of water and land. This work received the 2018 ADA Collection Award for Documentarians of Environmental Change. Acquired as part of the Archive of Documentary Arts at Duke University.

Extent:

1.0 Linear Foot
1 box
25 color inkjet prints
16 x 20 inches

Language:

Materials in English

Collection ID:

RL.11695

Background

Scope and Content:

Collection comprises twenty-five color inkjet prints from a body of work titled "New Beach" by artist Leah Dyjak. The images, taken by Dyjak on the Atlantic coast, show ocean and sand encroaching on and destroying human-made barriers and boundaries - roads, jetties, and groins - as people look on, stretch out, or stroll on the beach, evoking the nature of existence at the liminal boundaries of water and land.

From the artist's statement: "Conceivably, the ocean contains all time and all places, with the coastline delineating where the understood meets the unfathomable. It acts as a boundary, the line between where we walk and where we float. Standing at the edge is a way to become physically close to our point of origin — geologically, biologically, metaphysically. It is the terra incognita of the modern world. With every crash of a wave, the line of the coast as we know it changes; our data becomes obsolete instantaneously. Water changes state, weather changes everything."

The prints measure 16x20 inches and are all horizontally oriented. This work received the 2018 ADA Collection Award for Documentarians of Environmental Change. Acquired as part of the Archive of Documentary Arts at Duke University.

Biographical / Historical:

Leah Dyjak is an interdisciplinary, lens-based artist splitting her time between New York and Massachusetts. She received her MFA from the University of Texas at Austin. Her site-specific work combines performance, labor, film, and photography to explore how generations of human use affect the ecologies of place. Her images and installations often push the edges of the photographic frame. Her work plays with our perceptions of perceived boundaries and charts matter in flux. Leah is an Assistant Professor of Video and Photography at Winthrop University and summer faculty at the Anderson Ranch. Her work has been shown at Flex Space, Pump Project and Blue Star Contemporary in Texas and throughout the Northeast. She is represented by the Schoolhouse Gallery in Provincetown Massachusetts.

Acquisition Information:

The Leah Dyjak photographs were received by the David M. Rubenstein Rare Book Manuscript Library as a purchase in 2018.

Processing information:

Processed and described by Edward Coles, Paula Jeannet, Alanna Styer, January 2019.

Accession(s) described in this collection guide: 2018-0182.

Arrangement:

Arranged in original order as assigned by the photographer.

Rules or Conventions:

Describing Archives: A Content Standard

Subjects

Click on terms below to find related finding aids on this site. For other related materials in the Duke University Libraries, search for these terms in the Catalog.

Subjects:

Beach erosion -- Photographs
Beaches -- Photographs
Coast changes -- Atlantic Coast (U.S.)
Landscape photography
Liminality
People and nature -- Pictorial works

Formats:

Color photographs
Digital prints
Inkjet prints

Names:

Archive of Documentary Arts (Duke University)
Dyjak, Leah, 1981-

Places:

Atlantic Coast (U.S.) -- Photographs