With each place Mr. Forager & I travel to, we always come away with corresponding memories and associations.  Maybe with the weather, maybe with the food of the region, maybe with the experiences we had.  The work of Los Angeles artist Matthew Brandt takes the idea of associations of place and actually physically informs his work.

[ taste tests in color, laffy taffy 3, blue raspberry, banana and grape laffy taffy multi-layered silkscreen on paper, 30×40 ]

[ dexter lake, or 3, c-print soaked in dexter lake water, 40×30 ]

[ 120821716891, bubbilicious blueberry gum on paper, 40×30 ]

[ ketchup and mustard, ketchup and mustard multi-layered silkscreen on paper, 40×30 ]

[ marys lake, mt 2, c-print soaked in marys lake water, 105×72 ]

In his photographs of iconic American landscapes and places, the artist pays homage to the locale’s meaning sometimes by soaking his prints in the water of the scene in question, or by using unusual yet culturally meaningful printing mediums.  For instance, in his Houses series, photographs of typical American homes are printed with flavored gum, perhaps a nod to the children who grew up there and the memories the buildings carry.  For the Taste Test series, the artist printed quintessentially American landscape scenes with typical American condiments like mustard and ketchup or processed sweets like Laffy Taffy and Jello.

The resulting prints become not just images of idealized places, but those places have somehow become a part of the artwork itself.  Just as each place becomes a part of those who have visited it.

If you’d like to see more of Matthew Brandt‘s work, please visit his website.  Seriously, so much more amazing work to see there!

All images are via the artist’s website.