Young Americans is a coming of age story that examines young adulthood through the lens of rural Maine. These images were made in response to a short story by Vivian Ewing, titled The Quarry. Her writing was inspired by Joyce Carol Oates’ Black Water, the Chappaquiddick incident, and earlier iterations of the Young Americans project. The call and response between text and image established in this body of work play with the idea that photography is a narrative medium kin to literature or film. As the photographer, I contextualise myself as a narrator living in the same small town as my subjects but telling a story of Youth from outside the experience of it. While the images articulate the mood of Ewing’s fictional piece, they also chronicle the lives of these young adults in Maine.
