In this show, Missionary, I try to not depict the entirety of a mission but a small sampling of the experiences people have on missions. One thing I have noticed in showing this show and other work I’ve done on Mormons is that there are two groups in the church when it comes to art about Mormons: those that would only like to see Mormons portrayed as perfect, and those that only want to see Mormons portrayed badly. Notice that I’m only talking about people who are in the church. In this show I tend to show missionaries for what they are…people. So they might talk about the difficulty of getting a long with their companion and bear their testimony in the same interview. And if you think about it there is nothing mutually exclusive about bearing your testimony and complain about your companion.On the other hand I’m sure there are members who will scoff at the bearing of a testimony of the church, which to me is a sad but true fact. I’ve tried to keep the interviews in an anthropological style to preserve the voice of those who are talking. I tried to keep the photographs open, allowing the viewer to explore. If you are reading this statement you are a very sophisticated art viewer because almost no one reads artist statements. Thank you for you attention.