Barzakh is the new hardcover monograph of his photographic works by Joseph Cochran II, spanning over 10 years of  the artist’s work.

The title of the book "Barzakh", comes from the Quranic concept of Barzakh, the space between here and thereafter, or the stage between death and resurrection. Photographs, archival documents, and interviews conducted by the artist populate the book, creating a web of connection whose nexus is the artist's personal story in relation to the subjects he interfaces with throughout his extensive travels and stays.  

Cochran’s photography takes one through an envious array of life and it’s minutiae, through moments, time, and emotion captured only through a lens of someone who undeniably grasps this place we all call home and it’s temporality in a way that is unteachable, and only arrived at with multitudes of experience. 

While Cochran’s approach is entrenched in the craft of photography, drawing on the medium's specific tools, its real magic may stem from his ability to measure time, and space, in millimeters and milliseconds.

One can ascertain, its development derives from the constant struggle of survival in Black America, a sense of urgency where every minute is creation, every minute the world is falling to pieces, and death is always present. Through this lens, figuratively and literally the artist is able to recognize both suffering, and the supernatural; intuitively transcending the subject and becoming an experience between you and that decisive moment.

Photography is for Cochran both a way to record and catch the moment when people manifest their nature through seemingly trivial acts and mundane gestures. This hypersensitivity, the unteachable ability to recognize a momentary shift, which on one hand could be labeled paranoia, and on the other a deep momentary meditative state is the paradigm of Cochran’s practice.

Following in the footsteps of masters of photography the likes of Henri Cartier-Bresson, Gordon Parks, and Dawoud Bey, Cochran’s Poststructuralist approach stresses the importance of the signified, the idea – the connotation, which in turn is influenced by the cultural perspective of the viewer, where one creates their own fragmented narrative based on their own respective personal experience. It is an art which is made with time, and time expects it.