Miller: A lot o' people don't realize what's really going on. They view life as a bunch o' unconnected incidents 'n things. They don't realize that there's this, like, lattice o' coincidence that lays on top o' everything. Give you an example; show you what I mean: suppose you're thinkin' about a plate o' shrimp. Suddenly somebody'll say, like, plate, or shrimp, or plate o' shrimp out of the blue, no explanation. No point in lookin' for one, either. It's all part of a cosmic unconsciousness.
Otto: You eat a lot of acid, Miller, back in the hippie days?
Miller: I'll give you another instance: you know how everybody's into weirdness right now?...
I find this rather simple dialogue from the 1984 movie, Repo Man, appealing as an understated discussion about a personal fascination of mine regarding the notion of fractal time. The idea of fractal time is that variables constituting different circumstances in life may repeat themselves throughout time in a modular fashion, similar to observations of the Fibonacci series in organic manifestations, such as the patterning of meristems on a Romanesco cauliflower, or the scales spiraling around a pinecone.
As a child, I began to notice a cyclic repetition of occurrences. I grew to learn that some of these phenomena are understood through scientific study, such as the phases of the moon or the changing of seasons. As an adult, I find myself still pondering the inexplicable coincidences that science cannot address. I have developed an obsession with the seemingly scripted reoccurring events that I am unable to understand or ignore; the unplanned and unlikely reunion of long lost friends at key points in life, thinking of a song before turning on a radio to discover that song in sync with your imagination, or noticing a train car as it passes by with graffiti on it that reads "FOES" the day after photographing graffiti on a window that reads "HI FRIEND".
For the work embodied by Matter of Time, I relied on an intuitive method of photography, utilizing a pocket sized digital point and shoot camera that I carried with me at all times. Armed with ever-present photographic capabilities, I discovered the opportunity to trace my curiosity's muse by recording a chronology of, and thus signifying, evidence that seems to support my growing suspicion that, even in its most mundane coincidences, life is more complex than I will ever hope to understand.