IDENTITY, Scot Sothern’s newest and most original project, explores time and vast change moving back, at times, to the epoch of the American Civil War with comparisons to the current American civil discord. Working with found, antique, glass-plate Ambrotypes and using Photoshop to print and size contemporary images, then physically binding these elements together Scot is creating small art works that are equally digital and analog.

In the second half of the 19th Century professional photographers were few and far between. Using a wet-collodion process on glass and often guesstimating exposure times resulting in Ambrotypes that can be both stunning and flawed. Comparisons to modern day selfies and the value of a single image are brought to mind. While the selfie is shot and posted on social media, it doesn’t hold more than a glancing memory or any deep meaning. The Ambrotypes present people who are much like us but in a very different time. These singular portraits were originally greatly valued and personal but now altered they become objet d'art with meaning spanning generations and addressing the contemporary world.

IDENTITY, the who and what we are, has never been more out of the closet. People young and old are claiming their previously covert sexual personas. We are as well living in a world of technology surpassing the imaginations of only a few years ago. Cutting edge advances both socially and scientifically, are at odds with backward movements attempting to bring back the good old days that in fact never existed. Xenophobia, white supremacy, and gender bashing has elbowed into the forefront. Global Warming is beyond the brink of no return. America has never been as disconnected as in the immediate now. IDENTITY reflects the time and the mores of the contemporary zeitgeist.