For Immediate Release:
Fresh + Flash + Photographic
IUCA+D is pleased to announce an exhibition of contemporary photography. Co-curated by Jennifer Riley and Adam Reynolds, the exhibition will feature work by four emerging artists who share an interest in revisiting traditional themes and approaches to photography. The exhibition will open with a reception for the artists on Friday, February 19th, 2016, from 6-8pm.
Terri Bright, Adam Reynolds, Ivette Spradlin, and Michael Tittel are photographers who met in 2015 at Flash Powder Projects Retreat, an artist workshop residency, where they recognized a shared interest in the legacy of photography.
With the invention of photography, many thought that painting would simply come to an end and with the proliferation of portable, inexpensive, digital picture taking capabilities, pervasive thinking followed that photography and the photographer would also become obsolete. We all know that painting with a capital “P” did not die. Once liberated from the task of certain roles, in particular that of providing reports, likenesses (portraits) and scenes of historical record, painting became ever more materially and conceptually defined, experimental and expressive. Photography has followed a similar course, yet the line between fine art photography and consumer photography still poses challenges to the viewer and maker alike. What aspects of traditional photography are challenged when a photograph can be made by anyone with a cell phone? My belief is that very little is lost, much is gained. For one, most people use photo tools in place of note taking and sometimes even in replacement of experience itself, and a majority of these images are viewed only on the tiny cell phone screen. To discover the large scale, full color, or black and white photographs in this exhibition, one is immediately met with works that have been carefully orchestrated, planned, composed, conceived of and – are in conversation with a history of image making that reaches back 100 years. Taking pictures and making photographic art are like twins separated at birth and raised in contrasting environments. The four bodies of work in this exhibition present the genres of still life, portraiture, documentary and street photography, all thoughtfully explored and reimagined.
Terri Bright – The Encountered Still Life
Terri Bright reprises early modernist designs and principals in work that captures ordinary objects set in natural and built environments. Bold color and strong light patterns capture and define forms that invite the viewer to pare away filters of cognitive reality and to engage the work with the intuitive mind.
Adam Reynolds – The Documentary Approach Confronted
Drawing upon the sometimes opposing modes of objective documentation, personal narrative and aspects of straightforward journalism, Reynolds’ images are results from his hybrid approach to new work in the field of documentary journalism. Addressing the topic of the Middle East conflict in work that shows the hidden world of the regional conflicts rather than front line sensational images, Reynolds takes the viewer to the edge, around and behind the scenes -so to speak- to expose plain facts and truth with a certain neutrality of view. He reveals the simultaneously plain and compelling aspects of the conditions that impact and influence daily life of the people living in the region.
Ivette Spradlin – The Reinvented Portrait
Some argue that ‘likeness’ in Western art dates back to the Etruscans, yet we all know that the Egyptians were quite specific when painting portraits on the head tablets of their King’s mummies. Picasso famously presented abstracted views of his sitters simultaneously showing two or three sides of the figure in front of him. Today with the “the selfie,” portraiture has perhaps reached a new level, but what is it that constitutes a likeness of someone? Spradlin’s refreshing take on figurative work turns traditional portraiture on its head in work that invites the viewer to look carefully and closely to cull information in order to imagine and speculate what the face of the viewer may be.
Michael Tittel – The Street as Personal Narrative
Tittel’s richly narrative works hinge upon the decisive moment like that of street photography. The work is evidence of strong vision in which deliberation, planning and searching for content-rich opportunities meets the delightful and surprising instant. Here, the artist has captured precise moments that evoke a sense of individual loneliness and displacement despite one’s location amid groups of people in very public settings.
Cost: Free and open to the public
For more information contact:
Marla Roddy
(812) 375-7550
[email protected]