Over the past few months, we have been going through our collection and sharing some of our favorite photographs by the many great artists we represent. This week, for our installment of "From the Flat Files," we introduce a selection of works devoted to life at home.
While this selection makes no attempt at sociological objectivity, we believe that the many styles it spans have much to say about the different perspectives on the settings, rituals, and moods of the American domestic landscape.
While this selection makes no attempt at sociological objectivity, we believe that the many styles it spans have much to say about the different perspectives on the settings, rituals, and moods of the American domestic landscape.
For instance, within this genre, we can find the staged pictures of Julie Blackmon, Jennifer Greenburg, and Patty Caroll. In Blackmon’s Play Group, a mother and her children gather in a chaotic and cramped entryway — toys and children rest equally scattered on the floor. In Napping with Floyd by Greenburg, a woman (the artist in character) naps on a couch with a siamese cat sitting on top of her. In Caroll’s Bookie, a figure poses, engulfed with books in a home library in disarray. Reworking the domestic cliches of popular imagery, these artists examine the role culture, media, and history have in shaping private lives. Although their approach to the domestic landscape is different, they share the conviction that something important is going on — external forces are playing out in the private sphere of the home.
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| Jennifer Greenburg, Napping with Floyd, 2011, archival pigment ink, 27 x 27 inches, edition of 5, $3500 |
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| Patty Carroll, Bookie, archival pigment ink, 22 x 22 inches, edition of 20, $1500 |
Some of the domestic landscapes we revisited are charged with feeling, such as those captured by Cig Harvey and Keith Carter. In both artists’ work, the domestic experience is described not from the detached viewpoint of the documentarist, but from within. Captivating photographs, such as Red Jacket (Hanging) by Harvey (a bright red jacket hanging from a pink peeling wall) and Ofrenda by Carter (a dreamy photograph of a bird on a plinth, flanked by lamps and heavy curtains), are rendered with an intimacy that only an insider could possess.
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| Keith Carter, Ofrenda, 1998, toned gelatin silver print, 15 x 15 inches, edition of 50, $1800 |
Between these divergent styles, a photographer like Tom Chambers blends reality and fantasy, provoking viewers to imagine the stories behind his pictures. In Chambers’s Glass Flower / Flor de Vidrio, a deer stands on top of a dining table while a young woman seems undisturbed, or not aware, of the surreal scene — our sense that this moment has been concocted only draws us deeper into its drama.
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| Tom Chambers, Glass Flower / Flor de vidrio, archival pigment ink print, 20 x 20 inches, edition of 20, $1200 |
Other artists working within the genre, such as Richard Tuschman, revisit the domestic myth from the perspective of painting, cinema and theatre. In the painterly Woman with Book and Letter (part of the artist's series Hopper Meditations), a woman sits at the edge of a bed absorbed in thought, perhaps thinking about the person who authored the letter. The theatrical and cinematic image, evokes nostalgia, the loss of a time long gone.
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| Richard Tuschman, Woman with Book and Letter, 2013, archival pigment ink, 24 x 18 inches, edition of 9, $1500 |
Enjoy our selection! And please contact us if you would like more information about the photographs above.
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All prices listed were current at the time this post was published.
For more information, and to purchase prints, please contact Gallery Director Anne Kelly or Gallery Assistant Patricia Martin, or you may also call us at 505-988-5152 x202