Winslow Gray Road and Conversations with You - a two-part body of work
Melinda Reyes | Massachusetts, United States
Photographer: Melinda Reyes
Exhibit Title: Winslow Gray Road and Conversations with You - a two-part body of work
Location: Massachusetts, United States
"Winslow Gray Road" and "Conversations with You" is a documentary of a daughter's relentless pursuit of truth and meaning in the wake of her father's unsolved homicide, exploring the intersection of grief, memory, and healing.
On November 30, 2021, at 7:30 a.m., my father's body was discovered on Winslow Gray Road along the southern coast of Cape Cod. Investigators estimate that he was struck, killed, and left to die at 5:02 p.m. the previous evening. The temperature had fallen to 26 degrees Fahrenheit. He was just a few houses awaay from his home. No suspect has ever been found.
This life-altering tragedy reshaped my understanding of safety and justice, forcing me to navigate a reality fractured by grief and unanswered questions. In an attempt to make sense of such a stark, violent loss, I embarked on a two-part body of work: "Winslow Gray Road" and "Conversations with You." These projects are both an act of investigation and a cathartic release - a way to reconcile evidence with helplessness, fact with raw emotion. More than art, they are a necessity, giving grief a place to rest.
My father was one of over 21,000 homicide victims that year - 1,781 of whom were killed in hit-and-runs, 90% of which go unsolved.* In Massachusetts alone, at least 23 fatal hit-and-run cases remain unsolved since 2011.* This grueling absence of resolution leaves families and communities like mine suspended in grief, unable to fully move forward.
"Winslow Gray Road" is a three-and-a-half-year exploration of loss, using photography to document and dissect the objects and images surrounding my father's death. In the immediate aftermath, I found myself moving between two worlds: the familiar warmth of his home and the cold, indifferent space where his life ended. I gathered remnants from the crime scene - dirt, gravel, leaves, pine needles, a shred of his clothing, and fragments of the perpetrator's headlight. I made a cast of the tire tracks - a tangible link to the unknown driver. And, ultimately, I created a memorial there, a marker of love and unresolved justice.
Throughout "Winslow Gray Road" i explore the concept of weight and scale -at times moving beyond the two-dimensional frame as I found myself intuitively needing a different kind of depth. This led to repurposing remnants from the crime scene and the creation of multiple scuptural pieces - they became a cathartic release through multiple sensory experiences.
Inside his home, I lingered, drawn to the untouched rooms where his presence still lived: the scent of him, the careful arrangement of his belongings, It was as if time had paused in defiance of reality. Before anything faded or became altered, I began photographing his home. This became "Conversations with You," a visual dialogue between absence and memory, between the tangible remnants of his life and my response to them. I have faced the reality that this crime may never be solved and that grief has no fixed form or residence- it continually shifts. These diptychs seek to reflect this movement. Each object I documented, each piece I gathered, and every diptych i created has been transformed- like ordinary items elevated into extraordinary taislmans of memory
This two-part series is an exploration of what it means to live in the face of uncertainty. It underscores how an unsolved homicide is a slow undoing, an unraveling, a constant unmaking of what was once whole. It explores the dual realities and the tension between presence and absence, evidence and emotion, knowing and not knowing, and seeks to illuminate the complexities that exist and permeate one's life amidst an unsolved homicide.
*Statista/NHTSA
*Boston25News
Melinda Reyes
(781) 510-9863
www.melindareyesphotography.com
@melz821
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