When I first started working in Luxor much of my free time was spent walking in Qurna, an area of desert concentrated with ancient tombs and temples. Drinking tea with the people who live among the antiquities, I learned about the culture. These wanderings in and around the village made an indelible impression on me.

Recently while perusing a favorite antique shop in Luxor I came across rolls of tattered maps in a corner - topographical surveys of Qurna from 1907. Bargaining for the most aged and torn of the lot, I was not sure what to do with them.

Collaging pieces of the maps onto single pages and painting simple calligraphic strokes, like peregrinations across the surface, I saw how some of the single sheets created movement between one another and put them together as diptychs.

The series entwines my strong sense of and feelings for this place.

 

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