This magnolia tree is what I like to call my life tree. My mom planted it in the backyard a few weeks before I was born. We are effectively the same age.
I’ve always been fascinated by this tree, even before I knew that. It wasn’t like the others. The leaves are big and waxy and it has a gorgeous flower on it in the spring time. I have seen it grow so tall throughout the course of my life.
This is also the only tree that is still standing in the back of my childhood yard. All of the other trees I admired as a child were destroyed by a hurricane in 2022.
The past you grew up in no longer exists. Remember? But for some reason, the tree your mom planted before you were born survived. Maybe that tree will long outlive me as well.
It felt fitting to honor this tree in this body of work, where so much of me feels dissected and put on display for everyone to see. I needed an insular moment of ‘me’ in here. That is Under the Magnolia Tree.
This piece was very fun to make. We shot it shortly after the sun went down, getting bit to all hell by mosquitos (I think I counted over 60 bites on my body from this night) and dealing with all sorts of other creepy crawlers, especially under the tree. In the BTS timelapse you can watch me walk under the tree with my hands over my head. I wish I could have mic’d myself during this — it was hilarious.
