Katie Kelleher on “Empty Seat SERIES—Cowee Mountain”

The “Empty Seat Series—Cowee Mountain” is part of a larger photographic work. The Empty Seat Series of photographs was created through solo hikes up mountain trails and overlooks across beautiful Western North Carolina, explorations through windows of abandoned buildings and alleyways, treks across creeks and into tunnels, and emerging from exploding colored smoke. The empty chair represents that which is unseen yet is present wherever I go: my mental illness. To other viewers, it has represented an overseas or absent loved one, someone who has passed away, or even one’s own mind and sense of self in a Gestalt Therapy manner. Many of the locations, such as Cowee Mountain, were chosen for their natural elegance and to juxtapose nature with manmade invention.