Fixed Focus (Dead Center)

Artist StatementFixed Focus (Dead Center) presents 36 photos mounted in a grid, displaying excerpts from the archival files of Dean Conant Worcester, an early American ethnographic explorer and staunch supporter of American imperialism in the Philippines. At the exact center of each image is a notated correction, evidence of a factual error or typed mistake recorded into the archive. Blown up so that the surrounding text is only legible via snippets, the errors themselves become the central focus, as opposed to the anthropological “findings” that served to support white superiority and early notions of eugenics. By showing these texts as fallible and correctible, Syjuco hints at the possibility for a counter-narrative to also be applied to the form of the archive. Each image is printed at the standard size of 8 ½” x 11,” to further reference the official form of institutional documents and records. Source:Photographs of photocopies of typed manuscripts assumed to be transcribed from written notes. Taken at the Smithsonian National Anthropological Archives, offsite storage facility in Maryland.