Alana Celii
Bio
Alana Celii was born in Chicago in 1986. She is currently pursuing her BFA from Parsons School of Design, and lives in Brooklyn. Her work has been featured in publications such as A Field Guide to the North American Family, Hijacked, Canteen Magazine, Ruby Mag and Look-Look magazine. Alana is the co-founder of Fjord; a project whose aim is to bring opportunities to young and emerging photographers on the Internet. She has exhibited work in group shows and photo festivals in New York, Dallas, Fremantle and London.
Statement
In the introduction to Recovering Landscape, James Corner states "Wilderness is a socially constructed idea, a landscape, even though it appears wholly 'natural.'"
Following Corner's assertion, the images in The Wild explore artificial and natural scenes that remove essential contextual clues, and displace them into foreign landscapes. Whether interior or exterior, both landscapes combine elements associated with the everyday and the synthetic. The interior landscapes are constructed with the intent of educating the public on wildlife; in a sense, these landscapes are for the spectator only. They have paths that move the viewers along and demonstrate how to view the environment.
However, there are barriers limiting how much one can be involved with the landscape. The exterior landscapes contrast this notion in that they are natural environments that are being re-purposed for human activity. The relics that are left speak of an expansion that fell flat. This human activity is reshaping the natural landforms and altering them into an idealized space. These sites are being created for human efficiency and ease of consumerism. While this is a utopian notion, it is the goal of these developments. Both types of landscapes are a modern conception. The interiors are a way of viewing and learning about what is natural. The exteriors are a remnant of what was once natural, but are now decayed and abandoned. Although these spaces are both still strangely beautiful, there is a subtle but ominous presence of how we will view landscapes in the future.
