Lost And Found In Rural Maine: Scavengers Uncover A Shedload of Forbidden Sex, Tree-Climbing Cows And Mystery

All the images in Fishworm were found within a 60-mile radius of the artists’ home in rural central Maine. Everything is scanned with an old Xerox found sitting in the rain outside of the town fire department,

 

 

For years, Pia Paulina Guilmoth and Jesse Bull Saffire have been looking through people’s trash, abandoned houses, yard sales and flea markets within a 60 mile radius of their home in rural Maine and collecting things that catch their eye.

“Years ago, I found so many amazing negatives in a desk at a local, eerie, abandoned school that had been empty and partially flooded for six years,” says Pia. “A friend and I snuck in through a broken window, and it was straight out of a horror movie – everything left behind perfectly untouched. The photos were absolutely bonkers, some of the most emotive and decisive portraits, and action scenes I’ve ever seen of the staff and some students – really beautiful photographs.”

 

 

“One of my favourite scavenging experiences was at a yard sale at a state politician’s house,” says Jesse, “and when we told him we collect hunting and porno mags and stuff, he let us rummage through his whole shed. He had this absolutely magical collection of lesbian and femdom porn, including quality 80s BDSM stuff. Really transgressive and before its time, honestly. We had a real field day at that spot.”

 

 

Pia and Jesse have compiled some of their finds into a book called Fishworm? The title comes from another find.

“We found this women’s magazine from the 60s at a local yard sale and there was a classified ad that read ‘earn money raising fishworms for us’ and then a phone number,” says Pia. “We definitely would have taken the gig if we were around at the time. We also like to go fishing. So the title comes from this. It also sounds like it’s some sort of a parasite that might live in the water and mud. And thinking about it in that way also makes a lot of sense when thinking about the endless histories left behind, and hidden in this region.”

 

 

“With Fishworm it’s more like a chaotic regurgitation of all of these forgotten, and often secret, stories and moments told through the perspective of ordinary people and their belongings. The real things”

 

 

“Fishworm came from being really cold, and stir-crazy. Pia doesn’t really make a ton of photographs in the winter since it can get pretty brutal up here. Last winter while it was insanely cold we were thinking about the overflowing boxes of junk that we had collected over the past seven years and how it could be turned into something.”

– Jesse Bull Saffire

 

 

“Out of all the images that we collect, our favourites are family Halloween photographs, ones that show scrappy home-made costumes, or depict actual horror imagery. Halloween is our favourite holiday. In these days of hyper-surveillance we like to imagine that the chaos and mischief that encompassed our childhood Halloween experiences still exists.”

 

 

“Earlier that year we had found an old working Xerox machine outside of the fire station for free on a local holiday called Heavy Dump Day. We started sorting through the boxes we had and every time we found a good photo we would scan and print it until three months had passed and there was a stack of over 500 prints.”

 

 

“Throughout Fishworm there are a dozen or so photographs that we took on small 8mpg digital point-and-shoot cameras while we were out looking for photographs. A few of these photographs are of Jesse, there’s one of our friends cooling off in the river after late-night exploring, some photographs of the houses we snuck into, and interiors we explored, and some other nature photographs. It just made sense to make the book about collecting from both our perspectives, and from the perspective of the photographs we were finding. The whole experience of these late-night excursions.”

 

 

“Digging through archives in the home of a deceased paper mill worker, we found a box of stained old newspapers. In the mid-1900s severe snowmelt caused flooding along the river we live on. A cow was picked up by the rushing waters, and ended up sandwiched 15 feet above ground between tree branches. Our back windows face this river, and each spring we witness the flooding.”

 

 

“Fishworm also contains many photographs from Pia’s own family archives. This is Pia’s grandfather hacking away, in the basement of Pia’s family home, at a deer that he shot. The surface of the photograph had been damaged by water in the basement.”