Am I Another You?

EDITION

2023, Special mention

school

University of Nebraska-Lincoln, United States

Links

laura-cobb.com
@lauracobbphotography

On my birth certificate are the names of my parents, though the name of my social father stands in opposition to my genealogy. The script of his signature would conceal my birth as donor conceived (DC). The truth of my origin lay dormant for years behind his scrawl, burying my true heritage beneath the stories of my social father’s ancestry. Learning the truth in March of 2019, I began to slowly reevaluate my identity. Searching for myself along waterways, I was drawn to the Platte River, to its braids and channels, to the whispers carried on the wind, and to the stories buried in the sand. The Platte River is a braided river. Between the North and South Platte, it travels over a thousand miles from its headwaters to feed into the Missouri River. Much like the river, I, too, am twisted and turned into being, deliberately woven of social and biological threads. As I searched for myself, I clung to the river, to a song of water and light, for safety and reassurance. I explored the shores of the Platte River as if by knowing its sandbars, flora, and fauna, I would come to know myself. In searching the land, I found traces of people. In those marks, I found a longing within myself to know and be known. This longing directed me home to face the idea of my family as evolving and ever-changing. After meeting my biological father and half-siblings, I find my family can no longer be defined by a traditional structure. It is a web built by donation, longing, and desire, altering and adapting as we welcome more siblings into the fold. Exploring ideas of kinship, I collaborate with my family, viewing our bodies as evidence of lineage. Texture and form become important clues to remnants of past generations. I photograph hands and limbs searching for myself as I question the influence of nature and nurture. Lying on the earth and touching heads, we create a space to explore our physical and emotional similarities and differences. Growing closer to my kin has led me to reconsider the stories we’ve been told our whole lives. In questioning them, I create my own stories reimagining my birth along the water, weaving together the Platte River and our bodies through imagery and text within a handmade book. Through this, I interrupt the myth of family and question the mystery of donor conception.