Love Tally
OG ’97
SOS.
EK
ALEX BEN MOM
DAMY MARZENA
LINDA + HANS
NAD. SHERI
ANNIE ANDREW
SAV CIERVO
WALTER 91 CARMEL
KATHY FORSYTH 77
C HEART L
W
QR
LEON
ARROW
PS AH
SOLL J
LOVE MARIA LIKE TL
human injury vágfoto home press about foundation contact
portraits of our built environment by Anna-Mária Vág
Love Tally ©Anna-Mária Vág
All images and concepts shown throughout this site are the registered copyright and intellectual property of Anna-Maria Vag. No unauthorized use or reproduction of these images is permitted without written consent from Anna-Maria Vag and Vagfoto.
 
 
 
In the United States, the tradition of carving the smooth bark of the American beech tree has been traced back to as early as 1850. At Holmdel Park, in Monmouth County New Jersey, there are thousands of carvings dating back to as early as the 1950s.  Arborists define this custom as “human injury” and the US government deems the desecration of public park property as a class 2 misdemeanor.
 
HUMAN INJURY is an investigation of what compels the public to literally leave their mark on our natural landscape and the resulting semiotic patterns. As you might expect, most of the arbor glyphs in this park consist of commonplace names or initials within a heart. (How ironic that the act of deeply incising and scarring a tree would be committed “in the name of love.”) The tattoos with more obscure names and less decipherable intentions quickly proved to be more photogenic and thought provoking.
 
--Anna-Mária Vág