Do you ever wonder what gets lost in translation when sharing a three-dimensional object embedded in a two-dimensional print? Is there a tension created from the flatness of the 2D print and the spatial relationships of the 3D object being portrayed? Most of “PhotoDimensional”s artists make photos about sculpture—often with curious twists on one of photography’s traditional roles, the documentation of sculpture. Others literally make sculptures out of photos. The Museum of Contemporary Photography in conjunction with its Columbia College Chicago affiliate bring you work that supplies answers to questions current day artists struggle with.
This relationship between photography and sculpture has been an interest of artists ever since the invention of photography. Even Louis Jacques, Mande Daguerre and William Talbot recorded sculptural objects through photography, such as marble statues and plaster casts in the late 1830s and early 40s. This being an early attempt to overcome this new invention’s limitations, especially pertaining to dealing with visual spatial dimensions. Yet, with the advancement of technologies and digital renderings there are artists who use photography in this current day to meet more practical ends of documenting sculptures that may be less permanent and more ephemeral or remote. For instance, the earth art of Robert Smithson, or Andy Goldsworthy. It’s the same for performance artists as well. But along with this the question is raised about concerns of these documents lacking some aspect of “firsthand experience.”
Curator of the show, Karen Irvine, has particular interests that lie in the limits of spatial representations, which in turn yields to some of cleverest works on display here. On the third top-most level of the gallery you will find American artist Melinda McDaniel and Venezuelan artist Susana Reisman who makes sculptures out of photographic materials. McDaniel takes images of various textures and cuts them into strips and proceeds to form them into minimalist sculptures that elude the original subject matter of the photos. Hung in an Eva Hessa fashion, Reisman makes use of strips of light sensitive paper outside for days at a time, varying the degrees of exposure thus creating abstract patterns and gradients along with various weather marks. I found these two pieces to be the two of the most imperative pieces to the curators main theme of the show.
Spanish artist Pello Irazu combines painting, drawing and sculpture in photo with many layers that are translated in such a way that they invite to viewer to imagine the passing from the experience of one dimension to another. These compelling images create and illusion that’s difficult to reconcile in the mind’s eye. True, Irazu engages a theme that’s been around since the early 20th century, but his well-executed work has plenty of aesthetic appeal. While the show doesn’t break any new art-historical ground, it doesn’t make any grand claims, either: It’s simply a comprehensive, carefully assembled look at its subject.
As you descend into the second level of the gallery you come upon American artist John Coplans who started photographing his body at age 60, focusing on creating images that utilize the body in a sculpturally aesthetic way.
Featured on the first floor isolated in a dark side room of the gallery space is the video work of German artist Bettina Hoffmann. She uses a slowly panning video camera to present multiple points of view on subjects who are completely still. Entitled “La Ronde” 2004, the piece causes the viewer gets the sensation that the still life photograph has opened up for him or her to navigate through this specific frozen moment in time. Hoffman cleverly reminds us that for every given shot, 359 other angles are possible.
Immediately after this you are drawn into Debris Field, created by Chicago artist Heather Mekkelson. She makes three-dimensional sculptural objects inspired by disaster photographs she finds on the internet and in newspapers. Mekkelson isolates interesting details from these photos and translates them into sculptural forms, which she distresses so they resemble the original disaster. This is an example of a piece that I did not understand until I read wall text and researched further. Although fascinating to look at, the work has so many differing elements and blank gallery space doesn’t contribute to the destructive nature of what’s trying to be portrayed.
Although I found this exhibition compelling and thought that each artist translated dimension in fresh and comprehensive ways, I felt that without the wall text and contextual background an audience might not fully understand what the curator wanted to get across. And I still feel that the concern of a photo lacking “firsthand experience” was not fully investigated and considered either. Although that consideration may break into another medium or combination of media all together. While the show doesn’t break any new art-historical ground, it doesn’t make any grand claims, either: It’s simply a comprehensive, carefully assembled look at its subject.
Each contemporary artist featured had such different ways of traversing the mediums of sculpture and photography, and I feel yielded answers to the limitations of photography that invite the audience to imagine passing from the experience of one dimension to another and back again. I think this is a concept that all artists past, present, and future will and have struggled with and no matter what media is being dealt with must consider and scrutinize.
PhotoDimensional ran February 13th – April 19th, 2009.
Museum of Contemporary Photography
Columbia College Chicago
600 S. Michigan Ave.
Chicago, IL 60605
312.663.5554
mocp.org
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