We begin to transcend our family's generational trauma when we begin pulling the pins (each horror that is passed down) out of our sacred being. Rural Horror comprises four poetic stories that work through family legacy, generational curses, and ancestral scarring. The setting of each one comes from visions the author had growing up, as she interpreted what went on around her.
'No escape but down' forces the reader to the edge of a high seacliff.
'Suicide by sea' beckons the reader toward the most peaceful place in all the land.
'Gravedigger' buries the reader in a shallow hole.
'Incinerator' leaves the reader beside a blazing fire, to make what they will of everything that has happened.
Cover image by artist Karyn Ironsides.
Photography by Jake Lord.
Length: 26 pages
Release date: On the witch’s sabbat, Samhain, October 31, 2022
Origin story of the Rural Horror project
This all started with a deep separation occurring in the summer of this year. At that time I had some visions come to me about my family. The division I mentioned sort of set everything in motion and suddenly I was dreaming about a thigh tattoo (one I knew I would get eventually but never had the idea down pat). I know this sounds all over the place so bear with me. My tattoos so far are very thematic, with the top half of my arm symbolizing the universe, the bottom half the physical realm, and what came to me this summer was when I put my arm down at my side, my leg would be the underworld. So this thigh tattoo would be darker than the rest because that space symbolized something very deep for me. It went deep down the rabbit hole into the blackest part of me - my shadow side, which began to emerge during my adolescence through to my 20s. My brain then went back to lock down 2020 when I discovered the art of Karyn Ironsides. I ran through her entire Tumblr blog back then because her work is just so incredible. One in particular stuck out, shocking me, and it was like a light bulb went off, this would be my first thigh tattoo.
The pins reminded me of everything I went through back when I was a young girl, how painful it was for me, and the way my mind wrapped around it and interpreted what I experienced. Looking at the pins was looking at what had become of it all. It was all captured in this one drawing and not only would I get it tattooed when I was done with the project but it would be the working centerpiece of the project as well. Because my shadow at its worst was so focused on suicide back then, I longed to convey this through photography. I had some old photos of Lana Del Rey that I wanted to copy so that was the plan. A lot of writing was also coming out of me, so I naturally decided both would be shared together when I posted everything on Instagram come October, like I did last year, folk horror series style. But I didn't want this to be a series, and I didn't want it to be exactly like last year. I just wanted it to stand on its own as a project and be what it was because it was its own monster. One that I had to face and deal with at that present time. [This also led to me developing themes I will use later for books consisting of my poetry and anything else I create that merges self-help with horror. Some of these themes include: horror endeavors-we take on and work through these endeavors of horror in order to survive and thrive. We face ourselves and our traumas to become better, to grow into who we truly are, and came here to be.]
Like I said I didn't want this to be a series, more like 4 powerful photos to go with 4 powerful pieces of writing, so just like last year some mild research on horror subgenres was in order to assist me in expressing myself. I also needed to enlist a friend's help - coincidentally I knew one who just happened to be foraying into photography as a passion at the same time. I explained all of my ideas to him and he was thrilled. The project then was officially born. In my research I discovered rural horror, a concept that has to do with horror that comes not from an intrusive outsider, but a location itself (a home for example). A home is no longer a home, when its natural environment transforms into a site for anxiety, uncertainty, and alienation. In this form it haunts us, undermines us, and diminishes us entirely. The horrors it holds are tied to ancient religion, generational curses, and ancestral scarring. This made me think so much about my roots and where I come from and how much it has taken for me to undo/unravel my own obstacles that stem from my family legacy. I knew part of this project would be about breaking generational patterns and spells. To do that one must first uncover them, they must be seen and exposed for what they really are, only then can they be alchemized. Back to Karyn's work above and how it all comes together - when I looked at this piece, I saw her looking at the pins saying, "look at what all of you have done, and now it is on/in me, now I am bad too, and how do I make it right." This was my interpretation of the artwork, and it would work in tandem - seamlessly - for this project.
Firstly I knew I was going to use my hair extensions since all of the writing and photos would reflect my younger years for the most part. Like I was saying I had old Lana photos that I wanted to copy, and my photographer friend was very on board with this. I also really appreciated that he basically was willing to travel anywhere and do anything to help make my visions come to life. These are some of the photos that inspired the shoot:
Jumping off a cliff, drowning, being dead already, and then observing all the chaos of the past in an evolved way was the sequence that I wanted to use. Each scenario built into the next, and the order was similar to my timeline of evolution. Please don't think any of this was apparent at first conversation with my photographer, it definitely took me time to parse out this idea and all parts of it. But at the end it came together very beautifully in the synchronized way I just explained. I also noticed later as I was writing that I was incorporating all 4 parts of me that work in tandem to manifest my desires - air, water, earth, and fire. I thought this was amazing and it was completely unplanned/unintentional. I do believe this helped me bring everything in my head to fruition.
I picked a day to scout locations and found all of them would work. The cliff was at the Delaware Water Gap in PA, the beach was near my house vast and unending (never thought I would find it), and the cemetery was in my neighborhood, perfectly abandoned with even the names of the dead weathered off of the gravestones. It was very important to me to keep the shoot as authentic as possible --- we would go to the cliff itself and find an insanely high edge --- he would record me walking straight into the ocean --- we would go to the cemetery and shoot there at night. The other thing I knew was that I wanted to release this during the full blood moon. It is when we see her entire illuminated face and I thought it was fitting to take a closer look at the horrors that lie in plain sight, again to go with the rural horror concept. Last year I chose to spread my work out across the month of October because I wrote so much, but this year I could keep it within a week.
Cliff
Here are some photos from the shoot that we did at the Delaware Water Gap. The hike up was so intense, extremely rocky and steep at different times but I went with my photographer and his girlfriend so having two other people with me made me feel like I could go on and complete it. I brought my clothes with me to change and we climbed to the very top of Mt. Tammany, that's where we were able to get the shot that matched almost identically to Lana Del Rey's. The views were breathtaking, but it was really scary standing at different edges of the mountain, I had to breathe it out, but for art I'll do almost anything.
The Sea
Below is some footage of me when I first found the location, along with other important moments. I had someone tanning nearby take a video of me so I could test what it would look like walking away from the camera. This was one of the hardest of all the shoots because I couldn't get clear on the idea. In the end the simple walking into the ocean worked, and the day I thought to do it was very spontaneous and last minute. I woke up in the morning thinking how vulnerable I feel at that hour. Didn't do my makeup. Just put on a big tee and felt a pull to go do the shoot. It was windy and raining which I thought was absolutely perfect, so I called my guy and he said he would be there. After I hung up I realized I called him at 11:11 and I just kept telling them thank you. The rainy shot is me waiting for my friend at the location. I was sitting in my car crying uncontrollably in order to get myself into the right mindset. The weather was absolutely insane, but the universe totally protected me when I went into the water.
Graveyard
Here are some photos from our time spent at the cemetery - the last one is the herbs that turned black from how high the flame was on the candle I used to burn them the night I finished writing this piece. The flame was so strong and large, that never happens, I thought it was symbolic of how strongly I felt the words I was writing. I bought a bag of garden soil from Home Depot and poured it all over myself. I wore a trapeze style dress to feel younger. The entire premise behind this was me watching the masculine part of me carry myself out of this grave that had been dug for me, but it was genuinely just a dream. I couldn't leave the grave at the time, when I was younger. It felt impossible. I knew exactly who I wanted to do this with, and coincidentally the photographer was friends with him. I recalled seeing him at the gym, pale skin and very dark features like mine. I liked that he looked dead half the time, I needed someone who looked somewhat like me due to the concept. I always admired what he looked like so we reached out and he agreed to participate.
Fire
Here are some ideas we tried before settling on the final. For myself personally I had to keep in mind that this was the first get together that my photographer and I had, so it's almost like we were feeling each other out, figuring out how we would end up working together. I would later regret not making this one more authentic in that we should have been in front of a blazing fire. It ultimately conveyed exactly what I intended (just would have rather made it more realistic if we had more time) which was that there is a fire that I am witnessing, and I'm so close to it, but it's not burning me, not anymore. The fire symbolized all of my own family trauma and how that has affected me over the course of my life, from each individual that played a part in the way I grew up, down to myself and the way I chose to hurt myself as a reaction to everything going on around me.
Overall this was probably the most I went all out for my art. I had an amazing experience and I'll never forget it. Not to mention it just meant to so much to me that the universe kept speaking to me through my tarot cards telling me to have patience and to know they are working hard to help me (kept pulling the Temperance card throughout the weeks of the project). Ultimately releasing felt like such a relief, but I needed a good week off after of doing absolutely nothing. Every day after work or on the weekend I was working on this. It took so much out of me emotionally and physically but it was totally and completely worth it.
Jennifer Diane is a goddess of darkness, writer and model based out of New Jersey. She’s authored Folk Horror, Rural Horror, Devil’s Manifesto, Emotional Horrorshow, and Salvation. She writes for Healing with the Occult and speaks for the Enlightenment through Hellfire Podcast. Find her on Instagram.