I remember the intense smell of gasoline, the weightless feeling of being upside down in a flipping car, the red light of the car flares, the freezing night air rushing past my ears while my head stuck out the car window, and the pain of running away barefoot from the crash. More than anything, I vividly remember the night in 2008 when three friends and I crashed Parker’s father's car. The accident happened during the height of an opioid crisis in my hometown, while all of us survived the accident, two of the passengers died soon after from opioid overdoses. The anxiety, tension, and fear of death brought about by the current Covid-19 pandemic reminds me of the suffocating emotions I experienced as a teenager during the opioid crisis. Like a virus that seems invisible, something we cannot physically see, addiction can go unrecognized until it is too late.

Parker is a series of photographs made on the same road as the accident; it explores my recollection of the event 12 years later. This body of work examines the aftermath of the accident, what was left behind, and channels the emotions of that moment. I am particularly interested in how memory can become abstracted and distorted over time. The car accident is a visceral memory, yet now, I almost cannot tell if it is real or if it ever happened.