Rain Studies
2013 - 2016
Silver gelatin photograms on fiber paper
Rain Studies is a series of unique gelatin silver photograms made at night using photographic paper and hand-held light sources. This work, which attempts to make visible a tactile sensation, began on the Big Island in Hawaii, where rain is plentiful, and continued in Northern California. During these years California sank into a severe draught and weather tracking became part of the artist’s practice. McKenna’s constant anticipation of rain and the act of documenting it on the rare occasions that it came, became her own form of prayer.
Cry Me A River
Single channel video: 3 minutes 13 seconds
Cry Me a River is a single channel, stop-motion video that animates all of the Rain Study photograms Klea made from 2012 to 2015, during California’s most severe draught ever recorded. These photograms, made outdoors in the darkness of rainy nights depict an aspect of landscape we feel, but do not see. We all know (and even long for) the sensation of standing in darkness in the pouring rain. The staccato sequence of images becomes the rhythm of rainfall as the scale and density of drops ebbs and flows. This piece is simultaneously a form of deep observation and a prayer. With it’s title taken from the 1953 song which goes on to say “…I cried a river over you”, it is an invocation to the elements to feel what we feel and to deliver us from drought.