Kyle Forbes (he/him) is a queer photographer living Halifax, Nova Scotia. He is primarily a landscape photographer, but there’s nothing he will not photograph. His day job is as letter carrier for Canada Post, and he occasionally does work in the film and television industry. Never much one for sitting still, he can be found biking or running about town or out for a hike. Kyle graduated in 2016 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Mount Allison University and has the loans to prove it.
“Like many people during those early weeks of April, 2020, I took a lot of walks. For a variety of reasons they became a critical part of how I coped with what was happening. In those first weeks of April, walking around my neighbourhood, everything felt off. The empty streets and sidewalks felt as if I were moving through a parallel world, where things were the same but altered in some way. On each of the front doors, there were posted signs, explaining why we were not allowed in. The restaurants and businesses that were once a part of the structure of my life stood empty. I think it was something about how I had been transported to some alternate version to my world that had me putting mystic traits to everyday objects. To me, these notes on doors were magical seals, or talismans, keeping out the invisible danger. Spells on the thresholds to ward off evil. Reverse plague crosses.
“This series was originally intended as an archive of these actual and figurative first major signs that both my city and myself would be forever changed. Each of these signs were grappling with the ‘new reality’ we were forced to encounter in various ways. It was also an attempt to place myself in that moment, in the reflections in each of the doors. Even at the time I knew this moment was important. I wanted to document what it felt like to be in this space and time.
“None of these images have been altered in any way. Each of these locations were within the certain radius of my apartment we were permitted to wander. With everything that has happened since, I am glad I have this record. It is from a time I should be eager to forget. But I’ll hold on to this—until I figure what there is to be learned from it.”
