The Dark Light of this Nothing

By Peter Nitsch | June 28th, 2011 | Discuss

This piece by photographer and storyteller Erica McDonald is meant as a tribute to the neighborhood’s long term residents. Though the Park Slope area of Brooklyn, New York is no stranger to change, the long term residents who have sustained the neighborhood for generations are now in an increasing minority. The “old guard” is losing their sense of community. A new, affluent population, drawn by Park Slope’s popularity as one of America’s ten best neighborhoods, is swiftly overshadowing the working class.

The title of this body (the dark light of this nothing) comes from the words of the philosopher Derrida that reflect on the experience of the loss of the Other, or the absence of “what I myself am not”.

“Upon the death of the other we are given to memory, and thus to interiorization, since the other, outside us, is now nothing. And with the dark light of this nothing, we learn that the other resists the closure of our interiorizing memory.”

Erica McDonald began working in the field of photography under the tutelage of esteemed photo dealer Joe Folberg of San Francisco’s Vision Gallery. When the chance came for her to briefly run the gallery at The Maine Photographic Workshops, McDonald was rewarded with the opportunity to work with – and learn from – some of photography’s greatest image makers.

McDonald says about her photography, “Continually inspired by a long line of creatives as well as by the subject and circumstance before me, I believe in the importance of lineage and the narrative in photography.” ❚

Preliminary mock-ups from the book dummy.

About Peter Nitsch

Peter Nitsch has written 382 articles on this blog.

Designer, Photographer and co-founder of “Playboard Magazine” and "get addicted to ...", has won several international awards both as a designer and photographer.

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