"State of Gothic" is a temporal teleportation where the fictional great-granddaughter of Ella Watson looks forward to a moment when Gordon Parks visits a restaurant and sees society's failures during the 1940s. This piece speaks to the exploitative nature of the hospitality industry and attempts to capture the black person's body schema versus the gaze of domination that smothers their skin.

Ella Watson's fictionalized great-granddaughter morphs into a ghost-like figure, alive and well but stifled by her environment, helplessly holding water.

Being a self-taught photographer from DC, I felt a sense of responsibility in lengthening the conversation that Parks started in the 40s with Watson's series. I needed to be able to voice what felt like my own lack of agency within my own body while working as a restaurant busboy/food runner. The series became my ''fight back'' against the oppressive leaders that I was forced to work under day after day.