©Brienna Kane, jam photo 02, Stories You Keep Telling Me

This week, we will be exploring projects inspired by intimacy and memory. Today, we’ll be looking at Brienna Kane’s series Stories You Keep Telling Me.

I remember seeing Brienna Kane’s work last Spring. Some of her images were submitted to an open call through Midwest Nice Art, a collective I run with my husband, Tim Rickett. Briana Earl juried the exhibition, In Our Place, and Brie’s jam images stuck with me. Brie is able to balance intimate moments in our memories with contemporary images. Her commentary on the passage of time is accessible, for those of us who weren’t there and those that came before herself. She uses unconventional materials with images that immerse viewers into these series. She is continuing to grow as an emerging artist, recently being included in Peel at Rebus, a show featuring queer artists curated by Peel Gallery in Carrboro, North Carolina. Brie captures the essence of these stories and memories through her images.

©Brienna Kane, persimmons, Stories You Keep Telling Me

Brienna Kane is a printmaker, photographer, display artist, and teacher based in Durham, NC. She received her BFA in Photography + Film from VCUarts in 2020. Kane’s work has been exhibited in several collective shows at Peel Gallery in Carrboro, NC and The Anderson and Quirk galleries in Richmond, VA, as well as in more unusual art spaces such as the Curated Fridge. Her work has also been featured in publications by Themselves Press and one in collaboration with Carmen Winant while attending VCUarts. In June of 2022, Kane attended Soaring Gardens artist residency in rural Pennsylvania, experimenting with her tabletop letterpress printer and creating floral cyanotypes from the surrounding gardens. She currently serves as the Director of Risograph Operations at Super G Print Lab and offers printing workshops to the local community.

Follow Brienna on Instagram at: @briekane

©Brienna Kane, screenprint on wall, Stories You Keep Telling Me

Stories You Keep Telling Me

I enjoy utilizing unconventional materials and analogue processes to explore preservation and storytelling. Drawing from letters, archival images, and oral histories I create new, untold memories. I work with a combination of photography, screenprinting, text and installation. Materials I’ve worked with include: blackberry jam, screenprints, fishing line, linen, sugar, cyanotypes, fishing lure, inkjet prints, and family images.

©Brienna Kane, Stories You Keep Telling Me

Epiphany Knedler: How did your project come about?

Brienna Kane: This project started as a way for me to collect, preserve, and diminish my fear of forgetting. I wanted to make tangible images as intentional documentation to counteract the saturation of digital images. I scanned and printed images I found in family photo albums and canned them in a big jar of homemade blackberry jam to “ preserve” them. After leaving them to dry for a couple weeks I was thrilled to discover the surface of the images crystallized with sugar. The “canned photographs” really brought the project to life.

©Brienna Kane, clamming, Stories You Keep Telling Me

EK: What relationship does memory or intimacy play within your practice, and does photography become a way to navigate these complex topics?

BK: In my show, Stories You Keep Telling Me, I was inspired by a conversation with my grandmother, mother, and aunt where they were convinced I was part of a family trip to Maine, when in reality I wasn’t born yet. Instead of a continuous back and forth, we pulled out a photo for proof. I am interested in the influence photographs have on recollection, and whether you are recalling an event or just remembering a photograph of it. I’m a bit obsessed with documenting and collecting. This led me to spend weekends with family members, documenting their daily life. I realized I couldn’t remember the last time I was alone with my grandmother, away from the chaos of holidays, witnessing her life. This is how Stories You Never Told Me came about, which led to Stories You Keep Telling Me. The crystalized sugar on my jam photographs and cmyk screen printed layers speak to the cumulative process of memory, and the variation demonstrates fault in recollection.

©Brienna Kane, grandma the week of her 93rd birthday, Stories You Keep Telling Me

EK: Is there a specific image that is your favorite or particularly meaningful to this series?

BK: The image of my grandmother sitting in the white chair outside on my patio in Richmond, VA. It was the first time she visited me there to see my senior show that had been postponed a year due to COVID-19. It was the week of her 93rd birthday and I remember her shucking corn while sitting on the couch. She will be 96 this June.

©Brienna Kane, bird bird bird, Stories You Keep Telling Me

EK: Can you tell us about your artistic practice?

BK: I like to collect, dream and follow my instincts. For Stories You Keep Telling Me I gathered tales from my family’s trips to Maine. After receiving 10 letters in the mail, and pleasantly surprised to find some accompanied with photographs, I created my own memories from the amalgamation of words, pretending I was there. I enjoy having physicality in the process through shooting film, scanning archival images, printing cmyk screen prints, screen printing on the wall, thumbing through family photo albums, or adding sculptural elements to my installations. It feels more genuine that way.

©Brienna Kane, maine, Stories You Keep Telling Me

EK: What’s next for you?

BK: I’m collecting materials to develop black and white film at home. I miss this process and have been working to take more images of the people I surround myself with. This summer I’m looking forward to making more cyanotypes with plant matter from my parents’ garden. I’ll continue teaching and have joined a local Photobook meetup. I’m always looking to expand and nurture my community, and will continue writing letters to friends and family as a tangible way to contact those that are far. Stories You Keep Telling Me is an ongoing project that has had multiple iterations, and maybe there is a book in the future.

©Brienna Kane, jam photo 01, Stories You Keep Telling Me

©Brienna Kane, fish, Stories You Keep Telling Me

©Brienna Kane, Stories You Keep Telling Me

©Brienna Kane, letters from grandma, Stories You Keep Telling Me

©Brienna Kane, mother, Stories You Keep Telling Me

©Brienna Kane, red jelly, Stories You Keep Telling Me

©Brienna Kane, tintype, Stories You Keep Telling Me

Epiphany Knedler is an interdisciplinary artist + educator exploring the ways we engage with history. She graduated from the University of South Dakota with a BFA in Studio Art and a BA in Political Science and completed her MFA in Studio Art at East Carolina University. She is based in Aberdeen, South Dakota, serving as a Lecturer of Art and the co-curator for the art collective Midwest Nice Art. Her work has been exhibited in the New York Times, Vermont Center for Photography, Lenscratch, Dek Unu Arts, and awarded through the Lucie Foundation, F-Stop Magazine, and Photolucida Critical Mass.

Follow Epiphany Knedler on Instagram: @epiphanysk