​​​​​​​Susan Evans Grove

Visually, I am inspired by paintings and strive to create photographic work that is painterly. This body of work is created in the style of Dutch still lifes from the 1600s when a burgeoning middle class announced their wealth by commissioning paintings of opulence. In today’s society we signal our affluence with electronics. Whether by our own desire for the latest and greatest or the manufacturers predatory progress these costly gadgets phase out quickly and then pile high in landfills, creating an environmental catastrophe. 

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E-waste represents 2% of America's trash in landfills, but it equals 70% of overall toxic waste. The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that approximately 50 million metric tons of E-waste enters the landfill each year. It raises concerns about air pollution, water pollution, soil pollution, information security, and even human exploitation. 

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"Susan Evans Grove’s experimental photographs often ask us to interrogate our lives lived out of balance with the forces of nature.  “Still Life With Macbook” is her bluntest statement yet, and it would be funny if it wasn’t so unsettling.  She’s recreated the feel of a pre-photographic still life painting, right down to the coloring and the position of the objects on the table. In the place of fruit, she’s stuck motherboards, video cards, and plastic junk from a disassembled computer.  The flowers in the photograph are wilted, and the fruit, naturally, is rotten.  How much digital detritus are we chucking into landfills, anyway?  How much more dead weight can the planet take?" Tris McCall