Waffle House Vistas, 2018-2022
Read the original 2019 essay: The Bitter Southerner.
Waffle House Vistas focuses on the built environment as seen through the windows of Waffle House restaurants from across the southeastern United States. The collected images contemplate the surrounding architecture of habitat and commerce through the lens of a southern cultural icon. These photographs ask viewers to look up from their hash browns and acknowledge the institutions and structures that create real, yet rarely acknowledged boundaries that seem impossible to break through for many of us.
While the photographed locations vary by state, population density, and proximity to the Interstate highway system, the surrounding built environments share commonalities. The images look out from booths and chairs, placing the viewer as a witness to the intertwined narratives of economic stability, transience, and politics.
