Enveloped
Upon opening certain mail, I am struck not by its contents, but by its interior, meant to prevent others from seeing those contents. I wonder why a pattern, meant to stop us from seeing, is itself something to see. I imagine a person, working at an envelope company, who is asked to come up with such a pattern, and do it quickly. They could copy some other existing one, as most seem to do. Or they might, inexplicably, decide to make something undeniably beautiful when seen in the right light. They could make art. Such thoughts motivated me to start collecting security envelopes that came to me, over the course of several years. This art was printed only cheaply in low fidelity on envelopes, but I always imagined the artist’s sketch on the drafting table, with smooth continuous lines. My project is about recognizing this as art, made by some unknown artist, and giving it the attention it deserves, by reproducing it in higher fidelity through the medium of documentary photography.