Render
Part of Double Layers, a story told in sky and skin, code and memory.
Keyword: Screen
Media:
5x5 archival pigment print on 6.5x6.5 Hahnemühle German Etching paper with hand-trimmed edges;
Dye-sublimation print on ChromaLuxe Matte Maple panel (7x7 on 8x10)
Captured under a bluebird sky, this image began as a moment of awe—birds in synchronized flight, witnessed during an art date with my love. The etching print presents this moment untouched: no overlays, no interface, only the purity of presence.
But the panel print re-processes that memory. It overlays the photo with painted wall scars from the my home—scars left behind by a former partner, still unrepaired. I have wanted to paint over them for years. In this piece, I finally do.
This is a rendering: of memory, of pattern, of possibility.
Am I creating something new, or covering the old?
Am I still being seen as I truly am, or through a screen?
A sky full of birds—my favorite subject—captured during an art date with my love. The etching print is pure: no overlays, no text, no Photoshop. Just light, lens, and moment. Trimmed by hand to a cramped 6x6, its half-inch white border feels tight but sharp. These are narrow boundaries—but boundaries all the same.
It’s the only etching in the entire series without digital manipulation. But still the screen remains between us. This was my quiet refusal to add more filters, more edits, more layers I couldn’t trust.
The panel print, by contrast, re-renders the sky. Two birds are added. Scars from my walls—left by a previous love—do not float over their place in the sky. Overlay the prints and a ghosting appears in the upper left. A mismatch. The images overlap, but not perfectly.
Sometimes, even in love, we erase.
Sometimes we leave things unpainted.
Sometimes we’re in the right place at the right time—and we still lose something.
To render means to translate, to offer, to make visible. This image renders more than birds—it renders a question: am I replaying old patterns? Or can I transform what was once pain into something more expansive? The birds rise, not just away but forward. The screen, once a filter or boundary, becomes a surface of possibility. Here, I allow hope to take shape, not by erasing what’s been marked, but by layering over it with care, honesty, and the wish for a different flight path.
To render is to offer, to translate, to make visible.
I ask: Am I repeating patterns, or transforming them?
Am I still being seen as I am—or through a screen?