In my work, I've always had this fascination with what Roland Barthes described as “that has been”—the thing in front of the camera that was, once upon a time, real. Before that experience, I had an intimate interest in the Acacia species and their depiction on the pyramids in the Nile Valley civilization, but also their presence in the city and their integral part of being of that place, so the photograph is a vessel of that interest to some extent.