From Where I Am is an on-going epistolary body of work by filmmaker and artist Jessica Oreck. It is a collage-based, mail art, travel diary.



From Where I Am is more than a series of two-dimensional collages; it is, quite physically, a longing for community, connection, and identity - a reflection of my existence as a foreigner. In my work as a filmmaker, I spent long periods in Japan, Russia and Eastern Europe, I traveled extensively across parts of Africa and the Middle East, lived with a family of reindeer herders in Northern Lapland, in a crumbling castle in the German countryside, and a high-rise in South Korea. Before Covid, being on the road was an immense and fundamental chunk of my identity.

This series assimilates many facets: a ceaseless wanderlust, an obsession with collecting, a reveling in new perspectives, and a deep fascination with the impenetrable miscellany of detritus/treasure that filters through time. I am enthralled by the objects and remnants that fall through the cracks - caught somewhere in limbo between belonging(s) and trash - the habitually forgotten residues of other people's lives.

The collages each engage directly with a sense of place. Every collection is comprised of materials gathered in a single location. Drawing on the limitations and precision of the imagery, the collages reveal a sort of palimpsest of ethos - a layering of mutating cultural vogues, the anonymous censorship of time, and my own socially muddied sense of self.

The body of work as a whole is littered with tropes of fragmentation - implications of a new homeless, rudderless generation - splintered egos, empty thresholds, indistinctive, fractured landscapes. The series is motivated by an exacting arrangement, a sensitive cataloging of the sublime, casual, and transitory images that assemble our lives.

The collection functions as a form of continuity between my idea of myself and the reality of my itinerant existence. The sensation of being immersed in a culture and language to which I don't belong is of equal importance to the delicate lines of communication that tie me back to those I know. Each collection of collages is sent to various recipients, inscribed with a personal message, from where I am.