Eli Durst - The Community

What began as an initial desire to photograph the insides of church basements quickly expanded into a much broader series examining the fundamental search for community in America.The activities depicted range from Boy Scout meetings to New Age spiritual practices to corporate team building exercises and were all made in multipurpose community spaces that are ubiquitous throughout the United States. I became intrigued by the way one activity bleeds into another, creating a symbolic space of communal introspection. Put simply, these photographs are about the search for purpose and meaning in a world that both demands and resists interpretation.