Noah Travis Phillips: Dukkha (2026)

dukkha 1
dukkha 2
Dukkha is a humble artwork composed of scans of sweepings from my studio floor. Each image is one session of sweeping (though this is not something I do every day, lol) translated through high-resolution scanning. Dust, hair, paper fibers, fragments of drawings and prints, and unidentifiable particulate matter are elevated into a field of intricate visual information, revealing an overlooked record of lived and creative activity. The title references the Buddhist concept of dukkha, often translated as suffering, unease, or the fundamental friction of existence (the crooked axis). Rather than dramatizing this condition, the work attends to its quiet, persistent production and accumulation – the detritus of making, moving, and inhabiting space. Each scan functions as both document and transformation, shifting debris from the abject to the perceptible, from the incidental to the intentional.

Noah Travis Phillips