Jake Mein

Ashes focuses on a small town on the West Coast of South Island, New Zealand that has recently gone through an industrial change and saw a shift in its ecosystem. Treating this town as a case study for wider symbolism of fractured communities, I’m interested in the effect that globalisation has had on industry, firstly on a local level, but also as with my previous work, how identity is formed through place.

Having such a prosperous yet reliant relationship to finite materials binds one to the land, to the area, and to the vocation. This commitment, therefore, forges identity over time. Ashes asks the question of how identity can be shaped and what different factors play in creating identity.

The focus being a collective attachment on a localised and now defunct industry – is this lost when the physicality of place is removed? How does this supposed fracture present itself?

Seeing this brutal landscape seem unperturbed by a change that was so obviously impacting those who inhabit the area, why does a sense of self seem more amplified in such remote places? The link of stoicism between land and individual is something that only exists in these areas, the people reflect the area in such a way that it arcs back again to their overall identity.

Jake Mein (Ngaio, Wellington, 1988) is a photographer based in New Zealand. He holds a BDes (Hons) in Photography from Massey University. His work explores the sense of belonging, home, and the deterioration of familiar places and recently has looked into his hometown, Christchurch, following the 2011 earthquake which destroyed the city. Jake’s work has been exhibited locally as well as in shows in London and Australia. His project Six for Gold was published by the independent publisher Bad News Books.