Peeps

A few years ago while still living in the Ballard neighborhood of the city of Seattle, Washington, we would take five-mile walks in the morning three or four times a week. Our walking path was a big oval, northward through a residential neighborhood called Loyal Heights, westward down several flights of stairs and walkways to a public beachfront park at Shilshole along Elliot Bay, then southward along the urban Burke-Gilman trail, across a railroad spur track and over a railroad bridge back to our residence. While walking the first segment through Loyal Heights, I passed a house where one of the residents staged small action figures in changing scenes along the top of a retaining wall.

I became fascinated in the miniature dramas I saw and decided to order some miniature people of my own, which I called "peeps." These small figures were HO- and O-gauge scales intended for model railroad layouts. I would add several of my peeps to the settings on the retaining wall. Sometimes they would stay in the same place for days, but sometimes I would walk by to find my peeps in different positions, and other times my peeps simply disappeared.

I began to set one or more peeps in different locations along the urban trail portion of my walking route, where I found low retaining walls along the trail. Later I documented the location of my peeps with photos. Quickly I discovered that my peeps would have longer lifespan if I placed them in less obvious locations along the busy trail, otherwise they would be gone after a day or two.

After moving to Olympia, I wondered whether any of my peeps had survived in the urban jungle. One year later, on a trip to Seattle, I decided to make a diversion and drive to the trail to see if any of the peeps were still in place. Of the four locations I checked, I found one peep still sitting on his tiny bench at the spot where I had originally placed him. I decided to bring him back to Olympia with me.

So now the peeps are the subject of a series of artistamps. I selected the best photos and highlighted the settings of the peeps by using a graphic technique called a vignette to crop their photos.

I am considering some new future projects that will feature peeps. Photographing peeps in urban settings is not a new idea - for example, see the various books published by the street artist Slinkatchu. The peeps exert an emotional force on me that is not surprising.  "The feeling of being ignored and overlooked, of feeling small, is a universal one," says Slinkachu. "It is as easy for us to fall through cracks in the pavement in a big city as it is for the little people." Stay tuned for more peep adventures that become reports to the Eternal Network.