Matthew Marks Gallery

Questions for an Overcast Day is a series of thirty-three photographs of young alder trees growing along the Oregon coastline near the artist’s home. The series begins by focusing on the branches of the trees and, progressing from one image to the next, narrows its focus, culminating with several images of a single leaf. The leaves appear perforated, the precise cause of which is unknown. The artist likens the particular pattern of erosion on each leaf to hieroglyphics, reading in them a unique “calligraphy of disaster.” As he writes, “What would account for the condition of the leaves — drought, insects, rocky ground, disease, herbicide, wind?”