The Winter of 2022-2023, the California Sierra Mountains received a record amount of snowfall. The following spring, the valleys below also had an amazing amount of water run-off. My backyard fruit trees and garden loved the extra water. That summer produced an incredible amount of produce.

Unable to keep up with the bountiful yield, I started a photo project documenting some of the “Forgotten Fruit” that I found blemished, on the ground, or otherwise left unharvested. Many of the decaying items started to take on expressions. I used my interpretation of these expressions to create studio images of fruit relatable to our human experience and emotions.

Most of the fruit was photographed individually and some were combined in Photoshop later. No AI was used, and nothing was added to the fruit. All the pieces are seen as in-camera. No alterations were made to the natural fruit blemishes. Only minimal Photoshop was used to lighten the background, resize to best fit in the frame, color correct, and remove any rouge dust specks or lint.