EMPTY

12 March, 2025

Things empty can oftentimes feel occupied. 

The chair, emptied by time. 

The table, cleaned by use. 

The architectural structure, designed for openness, left to the ghosts that once inhabited it. 

One can clearly see that there is power to an object left empty that had a use. Chairs long for a sitter, Tables desire a meal. An instrument trapped in silence longs for music, and a cup lusts for liquids.

Empty vessels are the cornerstones of culture. They are the containers that contain culture. Land masses, borders, atmospheres and bubbles, chairs and tables, walls and films and skins. They all wrap themselves; around something. Enveloping experiences and clothing the unclothed. Culture is an effervescent being, a living bacteria that needs care and attention. It needs chairs, it needs cups and glazing and envelopes. But we are left then with the question: ‘who fills the emptiness?’

Is it artists? Is it the single mother of three trying to keep the heat on? Is it the captain of industry? Is it the crew of industry?

It’s all of the above. Zane Sullivan, the lens name, is no one. He is a vessel to be filled for culture. He is the citizen of nowhere. The inhibitor of noplace and the one without culture or tethered ties. He is the representative for the emptiness and a hope that culture can one day be appreciated rather than weaponized. Culture isn’t something to be waged in wars. One culture isn’t meant to overwhelm another, and arguably never could. Culture is the gathering of students in a classroom. Culture is the collective memories that haunt us in our sleep. Culture is a growth, something that is a liquid and fills any empty space, a piece of dark matter, a vacuum always looking, always seeking for a new member to be added to it’s collection. 

Yet pride, is singlehandedly divisive. There is no more divisive tool. 

“Do not be proud”, one has heard when needing help. 

Nothing causes excessive divide more than pride. Not hated, disdain, or even the concept of perfection or ideology. The only segregating tool, from the societal to the individual level, is pride. 

Why must we, as humans, have pride in things which we have no control over? Zane Sullivan has no home. He has no culture. No ties, nothing to be proud of, except what he creates. His choices, his decisions that drive him to his future is the only thing that gives him pride.

The contents that filled his cup, the occupant of a chair, the silent moment that slipped out of time and into his camera.