NEVER BEEN | NEVER LEFT

IMPERMANENCE IS A CONSTANT REDISTRIBUTION OF ENERGY AND MATTER IN THE UNIVERSE

“Detachment is not giving up the things in this world, but accepting the fact and to be continuously aware that nothing is permanent.”

― Aditya Ajmera

Impermanence is a facet of our reality, more than we might acknowledge. Feelings, experiences, and people come and go in our lives. We seem to hold on to places, things, and memories that give us a sense of who we are. Yet, this may be an illusion. Traveling can correct this misperception and stimulate the brain to experience our place on the planet as continually in flux. The story, Never Been, Never Left is Lincoln Castricone’s interpretation of how he understood impermanence (and his own insignificance), made real in his wanderings and felt most deeply under the expansive skies of a western landscape.

In 2013, I traveled with Linc (short for Lincoln) half-way across the continental United States. I joined him on one of his trips that he often made alone to photograph panoramic landscapes. Each day began routinely with an early rising, coffee and breakfast, and then we rode in silence in search of the moment of morning light raking across an expansive landscape. I soon learned that this moment was akin to a spiritual moment for Linc. Under his spell, I felt this same sense of wonder as I joined him on his quest: me with a video camera and microphone and Linc with a digital camera. With video, I captured the ephemeral moments of our journey and Linc pursued a higher form of abstraction and permanence in his high-resolution still images.

In our conversations, Linc challenged me to think differently about myself and “my reality.” He pushed me to understand how much my ego propelled me in my work. All the same, my ego keeps pushing me forward: I have this strong hunch (call it a belief) that life holds greater meaning than we might realize and that my own creative process can be leveraged to discover this deeper meaning.

This story of Linc is told in seven episodes, marked by seven days of our travels. The visual images that accompany the narrative are not intended to necessarily illustrate the stories he tells. Instead, imagine that this narrative was told as we traveled across country. The many places I videotaped are meant to embody the story as Linc’s life was enriched by being in unfamiliar places.  He died in July of 2023. His impermanence made real by his death. With his energy dispersed back into the earth, Linc regarded his existence as impermanent. In the course of our journey, he offered to me his perspective on death. “Our matter, our energy is reconstituted in the cosmos. There’s no loss, it’s just a redistribution.”

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