Part examination of the process of constructing a reported memoir, part celebration of Old Weird Rhode Island, this exhibit is also a farewell to a project that consumed me for over a decade. It’s a tribute to my mother and father, both talented amateur photographers, whose work gave me a rare and unique insight into their lives and passions.
DOWN CITY began as an unwieldy collection of photos and documents – autopsy reports, FOIA requests, missing person’s filings, personnel records, letters – that had to be wrestled into a coherent narrative about memory, family, and place. Now, on the occasion of the paperback release, please join me for an exhibition of the book “exploded.”
“Two very short sections open Leah Carroll’s memoir: the description of her mother’s murder in a seedy hotel room, and the description of her father’s death in an equally seedy hotel room 14 years later. Carroll proceeds from these haunting twin plot points through a patchwork of vignettes, reportage and reflection that reaches after her absent parents with sensitive longing.” – The New York Times
