807 is where my mother was born. It’s where my grandpa tended his garden and fruit trees. It’s the house my grandma made a home. It’s where my uncle lived until his last day.
The photographs in 807 were made in the last few months that my Mom owned her childhood home in the small Appalachian town of Clifton Forge, Virginia. My grandparents and uncle have all passed and no one had lived in the house in over a decade. Over time, my parents and I took furniture, kitchenware, photos, and keepsakes out of the house preparing it to eventually be sold. Watching my Mom go through this part of the grieving process, assigning value to the items her family left behind and eventually letting go of her homeplace, was difficult to witness. I felt pulled to document the house in its final condition and to create photographs that represented the spirits of my grandparents and uncle remaining forever connected to their home.
Absence is the subject of each photograph in 807. They serve as a record of memory.
I remember watching A Charlie Brown Christmas with Grandma in her bedroom. We sometimes would play this game where I would go running past the narrow gap between her twin-sized bed and dressers and try to avoid the newspaper or rolled up catalog she’d swat at me with. We’d just giggle and giggle. She loved classical, jazz, and polka records. I think we would’ve bonded over a mutual love of music had she lived a little longer.
I remember Grandpa half-singing, half-humming in the kitchen as he made hotcakes. He sweetened his coffee with honey and his apple butter and strawberry preserves were my favorite things that he canned. Sometimes his hearing aids would squeal and Mom would have to yell, “Daddy, you need to change the batteries.” He called me “Sugarlump“.
I remember my uncle spent his time watching westerns and movies in his bedroom most days. The only time I think the TV wasn’t on is when he got ready for church on Sundays. He played R&B and gospel tapes on his stereo instead. Almost like clockwork, every night he shuffled into the kitchen to plop ice into his water glass before going to bed. I remember the exact sound.
807 transcends time and physical space, forever inhabited by memory: mine, my mother’s, her parents, her brother, the neighbors, their church communities, and so on. Though the memories I chose to share in this statement are fond, they intermingle with and are contextualized by the challenges Black families faced in the South pre- and post-Civil Rights Movement. They are entwined with memories where toxic patriarchal behaviors were perpetuated and where generational trauma was unintentionally bequeathed. The complex spectrum of these memories are what remain and what each photograph in 807 holds.
Kori Price is a multi-disciplinary artist and photographer based in Charlottesville, Virginia. Originally from Culpeper, Kori has been proud to call Central Virginia home for most of her life and is passionate about telling the stories of her community. Kori holds a B.S. in electrical engineering from Virginia Tech and seeks to maintain a balance between her technical and creative interests with her work. She is a founding member of the Charlottesville Black Arts Collective and currently serves as their president. Kori has been a resident artist at New City Arts Initiative as well as a writer in-residence at McGuffey Arts Center. Her work has been exhibited at The Paramount Theater, New City Arts Initiative, McGuffey Arts Center, Second Street Gallery, and other galleries in Charlottesville.
