Handwritten statements on paper, combined with the portraits of When We Speak, aim to communicate individual thoughts, positive feedback, bold suggestions, and shared memories reflective of the existing environments in which these conversations repeat with each new generation. When We Speak refers to the age, as well as, action of when we speak. Through their perception of the present and the future, children were intentionally asked to hold these statements in their mind, as though they were having a conversation with themselves, and conceivably another.

Statements address issues of inequality, climate change, water, air and land pollution, homelessness, cancer, war, and drugs. Woven amongst these expressive statements are heartwarming messages of love and honest joys, surrounding family, playtime and “gellatos”; reminiscent of requests for simplicity. Joining these images is my childhood photograph, and a sincere statement that reads “HELP SAVE EARTH”. When do, or did, we lose focus of our own basic passions?

Given the time-sensitive nature of our changing climate, this might be the last generation to express certain statements as documented.

Seeing the value of both developing and past perspectives, looking at every step in the present as an opportunity for the past to teach the future, and understanding how to sidestep When desires for change look as if they might transform into resentment, all respond to the premonitory nature of this work - with change.