Introduction
In On Adam's House in Paradise: The Idea of the Primitive Hut in Architectural History, Joseph Rykwert investigates the notion, shared by some architectural theorists, that the biblical character Adam was presumably the first inhabitant of some sort of shelter structure in the garden of Eden. While its specific illustration is never given in the Bible, Adam’s house is often times alluded to. Only our imaginations could raise the walls and roof of what this structure looked like, but presumably if God’s hands were involved in its construction, its form would be divine in nature.
In this suite of images, I investigate the form of Adam’s house, or hut, and how we relate to architecture through multiple ages. As children, we frequently play by mimicking our surroundings or by pulling out some primal form of structure that is engrained in us, as if we were masters of our own, be it imagined and crudely built, shelter structure. As we grow older, the reality of survival sets in with the need to acquire and maintain our own nourishment and shelter on various levels.
This juxtaposition between child and adulthood sensibilities of survival represent an ageless cycle that when viewed through the filter of Rykert’s theory builds a very poetically complex relationship between innocence and the acquisition of knowledge, or more fundamentally the battle between good and evil. This struggle can often times ebb and flow through various occupants of a space by how they project their beliefs onto their surroundings. This observation is exemplified on several occasions, but also is informed on a grander level by my being a cultural outsider living in southern Utah, whose heritage as a state lies in the Mormon’s belief of it as their Promised Land. This perspective not only raises the dialog about survival in a desert climate and the impact of its occupants, but also exhibits fundamental religious implications about end-times preparedness.
Each color image in Adam’s Hut is a uniquely degraded 4x6 inch archival pigment print.
