Fabian and Rose: A Photo Essay on the Legacy of Lies with Erik Mace

Fabian and Rose: A Photo Essay on the Legacy of Lies with Erik Mace

Join us via Zoom Wednesday, February 5th, 7 pm ET

"These were two individuals I never got to know, perhaps never wanted to, and now never will."

Join Erik Mace as he discusses his recently published photo essay, Fabian and Rose. Begun in 2019, his essay in Southern Cultures features photography and writing based on returning to his grandparents’ house in Missouri for the first time in thirty years. The essay navigates the complexities of family history, memory, and the elusive nature of truth, revealing the intimate details and textures of a home that held untold, or perhaps unknowable, stories.

Fabian and Rose emerges not just as documentation, but also as a profound act of excavation, in which each image serves as a fragment in describing his grandparents, his familial history, and the nuanced emotional terrains between the two. Erik has inextricably linked photography and the written word to explore the intricate ways a family history can be constructed, hidden, and gradually revealed. 

For those interested in reading Fabian and Rose in advance of the presentation, please click here. In addition to presenting the work as published in Southern Cultures, Erik is excited to provide additional context and material throughout the evening.

Erik Mace is a visual artist based in Asheville, North Carolina, who combines photography, graphic design, and book arts into a singular tool of inquiry. In 2024, Erik was named the Photography Artist in Residence at The Bascom: A Center for the Visual Arts. He received his BFA in Visual Communications from Washington University in St. Louis and is an alumnus of the Contemporary Photography program at the ICP in New York. His work has been shown in galleries and exhibitions in New York, North Carolina, and Georgia.

Instagram: @erik.mace