"I read Roland Barthes’ book Camera Lucida a few years ago. I was interested in his theory about photography, and perceived it as the mourning text I was looking for. Barthes talked about how a photo can bring you off balance only by looking at it. He described it as, how an element, a true essence, in a photo can evoke a memory and puncture you with what-has-been. When it does, it causes you to pause and contemplate over your own presence.

When I re-read it recently, I wanted to transfer some of the energy in Barthes ideas into my works as a way for me to process memories. This process was only for me, we all have different experiences and I don’t think about how the viewer see it.

Even if I work with abstractions, I believe our brain always wants to look for something to recognize, something to associate it to, something that is of importance to yourself. My smaller works has elements that derives from my heritage, like the kitchen towel or an abstraction of a bird. But it was equally important to compose the work as a cross, a remembering of the passing of time.

In my bigger works, the focus has been on the feeling of a bright, airy space with minimal clutter. My inspirations always come from subtle things like a piece of a song, a sudden word or a place. A memory."

Harriet Raab