James P. Graham

b. 1961,Windsor, UK
lives and works in Terni, Italy

James P. Graham is a multimedia artist working principally in film, photography, drawing and sculpture. Having trained traditionally in photography and filmmaking, he is particularly drawn to the interface between analogue processes and high-end technology. He also works with polaroid film, which is believed to be the only visual medium to successfully capture the energetic field of a place or person. Mainly using landscape and nature, his work refers to the now disused term ‘scientia sacra’, where chosen locations and objects carry a metaphysical and ontological significance.

– Aleppo Red 2019 | ink and watercolor on layered paper
– Damascus After 2019 | ink and watercolor on layered paper
– Sann’a 2019 | ink and watercolor on layered paper
– Sinjar 2019 | ink and watercolor on layered paper

Location: Festival House

James P. Graham presents a series of contour maps of war-ravaged cities and refugee camps in the Middle East. They confront us with issues of forced migration and its impact on the environment. The works offer a stark glimpse into the physical consequences of the war in Syria and other conflicts, where bombs were indiscriminately dropped on homes, innocent civilians are killed or forced to flee to overcrowded camps. James P. Graham’s intricate paper sculptures are the result of a careful study of digital elevation models of these locations on Google Earth. The street plans of the bombed-out cities are carefully rendered. This gives the viewer an overview of the density of habitation and of the scope of urban destruction and the resulting effect on the environment.