Gracie Baer is a Florida-based fine art photographer and surrealist installation artist whose work finds inspiration from the complexities of human emotion and experience. Set against the backdrop of the animal kingdom, her series Corporeal Worth draws parallels between our relationship with the natural world and the society we find ourselves in, by contemplating the commonality between animals and people, in both life and in death. She accomplishes this by finding, storing, and photographing deceased birds in a series of installation-like self-portraits, all connected by a thin red twine, that explores the sacred significance that life can hold.

The sentiment found in her series is not only about life and death but also a comparison of the apathy and blindness one might have towards these creatures, and even to our own role in society. There is an abundance of feeling and emotion taking place every second of every day that we often push aside and purposely ignore to make our lives easier. However, it’s not easier, it’s just a band-aid of periodic numbness that we mask ourselves with to deal with the pain and heartbreak that accompanies our journey through the human experience. Instead of ignoring these things we feel, Baer has found peace and contentment in embracing them via photographic contemplation. The use of red in this project is a way of creating a seam through each photograph. Red, like her series Corporeal Worth, in general, is a color that is loaded with different perceptions such as love, death, lust, and rage, thus being the color that can physically tie both the bird and human back to earth with the innate symbiosis that the color provokes. 

The sentimental implication of this project stems from her childhood experiences of growing up on a small farm, where her pets and livestock were her best friends. Through this, she constantly witnessed the circle of life that she felt others didn’t acknowledge with the appropriate level of importance or worth. This experience helped cultivate her beliefs as she matured and recognized the malicious treatment from humans to both animals and other people which started her on a journey of contemplation concerning the commonality between animals and people. She shared with us that the “Human manifestation of control equates to cruelty, thus writing a script for lives of conceit and the desire to be greater than others. The truth behind this societal blemish goes deeper than the domination of one species over another. A constant battle for power and control drives humanity into great divides to find significance in one’s self.”

Suffering from both a lack of self-confidence and contentment in Baer’s own mind, she related and drew parallels to the creatures considered weak and insignificant by those around her. Thus, her work falls into a deep well of exploration of the limitless boundaries of the human psyche and the mortal body. To her, “When looking at something dead, be it on the street or in the woods, the typical thought is to turn away in disgust, but I feel there is so much more to be seen. These creatures were a valued part of our ecosystem, some of these creatures had life mates, and even in death, they hold an individual beauty and importance to the environment and their corpses will go on to feed the earth. I want to represent the full circle of living and dying.”

Two great examples of her imagery created on her 4x5 camera and Pentax 6x7 are House Finch and Line Up. House Finch, the most personal photograph in the series, captures the heartbreaking reality of the love lost between two house finches, who find and mate with a partner for life. Sitting outside one day, Baer witnessed a cat attack on this female house finch. Unfortunately, she was not able to save the little bird. What she was able to save and embody was the desperation and distress of the bird’s male partner, who called out for hours through the dead of night, begging for his loved one to come back to him. Her photograph draws a line, both literally and figuratively, from our hearts to our deceased loved ones, humans and animals alike. Line Up, the final image of her series, shows an alternative perspective, that perhaps death isn’t always lonely. The human legs with the red anklet suggest a gesture of respect to the birds, perhaps hovering above, the person gazes while weeping or prepares to bury them.

Finding these dead birds, picking them up, and storing them until Baer is ready to construct her photographs before respectfully burying them is all a part of her creative process. Beginning in 2018, and ending in 2020, each image was planned after finding a bird and taking some time to understand the specific nature of the creature and it’s connection to the artist. Unlike more impulsive photographers, all of her images were planned and sketched out before photographing, often times with long pauses between image creation. Due to each photograph holding such a strong sentiment and subconscious influence, it was important to the artist to develop a deep sense of how and what she wanted to convey in each photograph, whether that was through the use of red, the placement of the bird, or its connection with the human. 

The value of the animals in her photographs is often a metaphor for her own psychological navigation of her true value as a woman in society. Often putting her in vulnerable situations while creating nude self-portraits in the woods, she felt a deep sense of connection and empowerment by relating to the creatures she was handling and photographing. The birds themselves, and by relation the artist, are not meant to be seen as objects, but rather as significant and important co-inhabiters of the world that allow us to investigate our own, often society prescribed, perceptions of the world.

Baer’s series on observing nature and learning to separate ourselves from distractions not organic, or by nature’s hand, allows us to appreciate the intricate details that both flora and fauna hold. It’s easy for some to pass by the dead and ignore the beauty of the things soon to be given back to the earth. However, the deceased birds that she has collected and photographed enable us to observe their beauty much closer than we would be able to if they were alive and capable of fleeing. Although witnessing death brings grief, it is also an opportunity to study a world that otherwise tends to scurry at the sight of a human.

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Gracie Baer is a fine art photographer originally from Palm Valley, Florida. Her interest in photography began earlier than age seven. She received a BS in Photography with a minor in Creative Writing from the University of Central Florida. Her work has been published in Halation Magazine, and exhibited at the Southeast Museum of Photography, Snap! Orlando Contemporary Art Gallery, and Mize Gallery. She also held a solo exhibit at Abraxas Book Store in Daytona Beach, Florida. Her work concerns topics involving the human psyche, the power and allure of nature, and perception of animal life. Through the use of photography, sculptural installation, organic objects, and specimens, she creates tangible studies and parallels to the natural world and human cognition.

Connect with Gracie Baer on her Website and on Instagram!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Michael Behlen is an instant film addict and the founder and publisher of Analog Forever Magazine. For the last 6 years, Behlen has become an obsessive community organizer in the film photography world, including launching the independent publishing projects PRYME Magazine and PRYME Editions, two enterprises dedicated to the art of instant film. Through these endeavors, he has featured and published 200+ artists from around the globe via his print and online publications.

He has self-published two Polaroid photobooks -“Searching for Stillness, Vol. 1” and “I Was a Pioneer,” literally a boxed set of his instant film work. His latest book, Searching for Stillness Vol II was published in 2020 by Static Age. He has been published, been interviewed, and been reviewed in a quantity of magazines and online publications, from F-Stop and Blur Magazine to the Analog Talk Podcast. He loves the magic sensuality of instant film: its saturated, surreal colors; the unpredictability of the medium; it’s addictive qualities as you watch it develop. He spends his time shooting instant film and backpacking in the California wilderness, usually a combination of the two.

Connect with Michael Behlen on his Website and on Instagram!

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