Forrest Aguar: Ikigai

Forrest Aguar: Ikigai by Sarah StankeyMay 11, 2013

Turn

I met Forrest Aguar at the 2013 SPE in Chicago. We were both participating in the student portfolio reviews all morning and taking a break in the waiting area while viewing our peers’ work. I am very pleased to show the work that I saw in Forrest’s portfolio that day.
-Sarah Stankey

Forrest Aguar is receiving his BFA from the University of Georgia in Spring of 2013. His work has been shown in solo and group exhibitions. He is currently publishing a collaborative photography and creative writing book.

We’ve Had Enough

Head Games

Inertia

Ikigai

Ikigai is a Japanese concept that means, “a reason for being.” Everyone is considered to have one, but it is only through a deep and lengthly search of self that it can be found.

I capture fleeting moments of suggestion, the points between movement and stasis, facts and the material itself. I harness the tension between what’s seen and unseen, focusing on this seductive edge. It is the power and impotence of the gaze. The faces are concealed, veiled or cut out of the frame, bearing no witness to time and place. The process exaggerates the photographic elements building ambiguity, confusion and the abstract.

I am aching to connect with a distant feeling, a lost memory, that explains the absurdity and melancholy I often feel. The series Ikigai visually represents the confusion and desperation in my search for a reason for being.