In the months after my Grandfather’s passing, after the majority of our mourning had ceased, it seemed unlikely that my Grandmother would truly recover anytime soon. Having spent most of her lifetime with one person in a small house not meant for many more, she embarked on a new life of general solitude and quiet days mostly accented by the television and brief journeys to the supermarket.

As preparation for this brief project, I sat and interviewed my Grandmother, asked her questions about her life, her past with my Grandfather, about her feelings after his passing, about the house. While the questions proved difficult for me to ask, they were met with good humor and answers that seemed to have been rolling around in her mind for some time. She expressed no regret, no anxiousness, and not a hint of silence, though her answers to my questions often proved to just break the surface of truth. Her feelings, guarded behind walls of sheetrock, never quite came out like I had expected.

During the time that I spent photographing her following my Grandfather’s passing, it felt as though the inanimate objects surrounding her had gained a life of their own. Each tiny model became characteristic of a voice, a few words to cut through a vacant air. It was as if the space and spirit that my grandfather would bring to the house had snuck into each tiny figurine. The implication of life and character must truly bring comfort to her in such a quiet home.

Milling about with the camera, only stopping for thoughts between frames of film, she enlightened me with countless anecdotes of better times, of traveling across the country by train, of their youth and the War. At times, she seemed to often address the life of my Grandfather in the present tense, as if he were there in the room. According to her, he is still there. Still laughing. Still smiling. Still speaking.