Cole Caswell, Portraits from the Peripheral Subsistence portfolio 5, 2013-2024, Tintypes, 8 x 10 inches, $900.

Peripheral Subsistence is one aspect of a nomadic photographic trek across the United States. The images made for the project use the historic wet plate collodion process to explore the entangled survival tactics of people living or subsisting on the fringes of today’s world. What sort of edge is described when living takes on these conditions?  The travels that make up this exploration are referred to as the Unknown Expedition, a research driven trek into the peripheral American landscape. The meandering course is determined based on research interests and an ever-growing network of people and places.  The coalescing focus of the expedition investigates contemporary forms of subsistence living.  The expedition is open ended at this point in time. In its entirety it could be seen as a performance, a moving installation, a research kit, or a studio. In parts the project is a photographic catalyst, a collection of stories, an archive of relics, a meal, and a set of questions propelling one to search out new perspectives and options.

Cole Caswell researches the remnants and patterns in our landscape that reflect contemporary strategies of survival. Through strata of observation, technology, subjectivity, and his surroundings, Caswell investigates geography and its impact on our perceived ability to survive. He uses traditional, historic and digital photographic media to investigate our present condition. For most of the year Cole is working and living in a nomadic format traveling throughout the county exploring our ability to subsist within the contemporary environment. Caswell travels in an 80’s VW camper van with a portable darkroom mounted to the back and uses alternative photographic process to create works while in the field. When the warmer weather returns to Maine he migrates towards his studio on Peaks Island off the coast of Portland. In 2009 Caswell started offering Tintype portrait commission to the public under the project name AGNO3lab which is still actively being invited to various venues from wild hog BBQs in the everglades of Florida to the Colby Art Museum in Maine. Constantly working on many types of projects Cole has collaborated with the arts collective Spurse, The Nation Park System, and The Kohler Center for The Arts. He currently holds adjunct faculty positions at Southern Maine Community College, and Prescott College in Arizona – where he develops and teaches photography courses remotely. In addition to these teachings Cole has lectured at the Maine Media Workshops, Kohler Arts Center, Syracuse University’s School of Architecture, The School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Tufts University and the Bakery Photo Collective.