Adam Frelin

Lost At Sea

50 framed digital prints
11" x 14" each (50 total)
2006-2007

While an artist-in-residence at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Massachusetts, I took an interest in how strong an effect the ocean and the weather had on the people of Cape Cod, both historically as well as into the present day. The phrase "lost at sea" resonated with me, conjuring up images of dead men floating in the ocean while their women waited alone for them. I began photographing every tombstone on the Cape that contained those words. What intrigued me in particular about burial plots for people lost at sea was that, unlike the other tombstones in the cemetery, these plots are empty, marking only the place where the body might have been buried if it were to be found.