Winslow Gray Road

My father’s body was discovered on Winslow Gray Road on the southern coast of Cape Cod. It was November 30th, 2021 at 7:30 a.m. It is estimated that he was struck, killed, and left to die at 5:02 p.m. the prior evening. It was 26 degrees Fahrenheit and he was a few houses away from his own. No suspect has ever been found.

Winslow Gray Road is a three-and-a-half year examination of this profound loss, using photography to document and analyze the objects surrounding his death - collecting dirt, gravel, leaves, pine needles, police tape, and a piece of his clothing that remained. I found remnants from the vehicle owned by the perpetrator, these sharp, orange fragments of a headlight shattered on impact with my father’s body and became a tangible link to the killer. This active and ongoing narrative is a convergence of personal emotions and factual reality, a seemingly impossible attempt at balancing evidence with helplessness and emotional devastation. This work is a type of investigation and a purging that has felt necessary to understand something so tragic.

The project evolved from the two-dimensional photographs of the remnants of the crime scene to then repurposing those remnants into sculptural pieces as I found myself needing more depth beyond the frame. I began juxtaposing the photographs with the sculptures - both of equal importance. Within this process, the concept of weight and scale became synonymous with the burden I have been carrying. I found it imperative to have the authentic objects line up with what I imagined the horror to be like, all the while seeking the need to find a place for grief to rest.

The tragic loss of my father has left me to grapple with the painful aspects of uncertainty. The absence of witnesses and surveillance footage, along with the nature of this unsolved homicide has forced me to search for evidence. My visits to the site of the killing have been frequent. They began the day his body was discovered mere steps from his home. I surveyed the land. I then created a memorial there.

The work in this project underscore that an unsolved homicide is a type of undoing, unveiling - like an unraveling of connective fibers that prevent any semblance for true solace to exist when trauma occurs. Winslow Gray Road explores what it means to live within 2 opposing realities - the tangible and the intangible and seeks to draw the viewer into the complexities that exist and permeate ones life amidst an unsolved homicide.

Photographer’s Statement: There were over 21,000 homicides in the U.S. the year my father was killed and of that 1,781 were hit and run fatalities - 90% of which go unsolved. In Massachusetts alone, at least 23 fatal hit-and-run cases remain unsolved since 2011.” This grueling absence of resolution leaves families and communities like mine suspended in grief, unable to fully move on.

Our news has become saturated with national and global atrocities and we have unintentionally become more desensitized and indifferent to news of a smaller scale and only that which directly touches our lives. Leaving those who personally experience homicide feeling isolated. This project is dedicated to the 23 individuals and their families in Massachusetts whose lives were lost and their homicide still remains unsolved.