Jamie Carayiannis

Jamie Carayiannis is a fine art photographer from Northern Virginia. Primarily interested in the landscape, her work addresses the complex relationships that humans develop with their environments. More recently she has been interested in exploring her own energy use and its connection to coal extraction processes. Jamie graduated from James Madison University with a BFA in Studio Art and minor in Spanish and earned her MFA in Photography from the Savannah College of Art & Design. She currently resides in Northern Virginia and is an Adjunct Photography Instructor at the Art Institute of Washington - Dulles.

Power Statement

The photographic body of work, Power, is an examination of energy use. Specifically, Power explores coal and the industry’s use of mountaintop removal mining processes. This series of photographs contextualizes my own energy consumption and considers how communities in the Southwest region of my home state of Virginia have been negatively affected. Further, Power addresses concerns regarding the photograph’s ability to serve as a viable method of scientific measurement while examining the relationship between performance and photographic documentation. I have conducted and documented a series of small-scale experiments and performances that aim to demonstrate the magnitude of mountaintop removal mining’s impact. In an effort to provide the viewer with a greater sense of place, Power also includes a series of landscape images of the affected region. Together, the two sets of images speak to and inform one another. I am simultaneously critical of and complicit in the issue of energy consumption.