REPRESENTATION ANNOUNCEMENT

We are delighted to announce the representation of Italian artist, Manuel Cosentino.

The Behind a Little House series was exhibited at the Klompching Gallery, as part of its annual summer exhibition, in which the gallery exhibits new and fresh work by emerging artists. In his first major body of work, Cosentino's thoughtfully observed variations juxtaposed with a static landscape, are exquisitely made photographs connecting his subject with the human condition through color, space and minimalism.

Photographed over a two-year period, the eight photographs that form the series, depict a nondescript house—located on a hill in a non-disclosed location—with the changing wild and dramatic weather patterns serving as the backdrop. The modestly-sized photographs are nothing short of breathtaking, while at the same time being quiet and understated. Touching upon the themes of universality of home and of 'our' place in the world beneath one sky, Cosentino has left the narrative open, so that the viewer can bring their own story to bear on the photographs. Embraced by audiences world-wide, the Behind a Little House has been featured in numerous online and print publications including Le Monde and The Huffington Post.

  

MANUEL COSENTINO (b.1980, Italy) studied at the Istituto Europeo di Design in Rome, before moving to London where he worked as a visual effects artist in the film industry. After contributing to several movies, including Harry Potter and The Order of the Phoenix and Narnia Prince Caspian, he returned to Italy to focus solely on his fine art photographic practice. Cosentino’s work has been shown at Galerie Huit during the Les Rencontres d’Arles, the Museo Diocesano Francesco Gonzaga (Italy), Museo Civico G. Fattori (Italy), Royal Photographic Society (London), NoFound Photo Fair (Paris) and the Photo Center North West (Seattle). In 2013 he was awarded the Premio Combat Prize (Livorno, Italy).

His work can be found in the permanent collection of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France, as well as several private and corporate collections in Europe and the US.

ODETTE ENGLAND: AMERICAN PHOTO

Thrice Upon a Time featured in American Photo

Text by Lori Fredrickson

While darkroom experimentation is largely a thing of the past, the longing to connect with a physical aspect of picture- making remains, especially for photographers working with natural subjects. Their resulting photos broaden the exploration of elemental phenomena, and engage more personal ties to land, material, and memory.

Mum #4 (Right Foot), 2012 © Odette England

For Australia-based Odette England’s project Thrice Upon a Time, working with the material of the landscape was literally tied to the land itself. England focused on the terrain of her childhood home, a 200-acre farm in the small settlement of Ponde in South Australia, by a two-step process: a 2005 journey (before conceiving the project) to capture the location on film, and a 2010 return by her parents, who re-trod the area with the processed negatives attached to the soles of their shoes.

For England, the concept of having the film “work the land” related to how her parents physically worked the land when she was a child, before the threat of financial troubles forced her family to leave in 1989. “Living on a farm not only ties you to a specific economy, but also to seasonal rhythms,” she says. “The farm has changed hands four or five times since then, and with each passing year and new owner, I can’t help but feel that the farm dies a small death.”

Ultimately, she says, photographing the farm wouldn’t have made sense without a material connection—what had been lacking in her memory was that physical relationship. “It was an urgent thing to understand this particular patch of dirt,” England says. “It was the material that made me.”

Read the full article HERE.

ODETTE ENGLAND: REVIEW FOR "OF WALKING"

Chicago Reader Blog preview for Of Walking at the MoCP

"In its early days, photography was often confined to the studio, where subjects posed stock-still for as long as it took an image to be fixed on a glass plate. When film cameras became portable and, later, handheld, the medium easily moved outdoors, keeping pace with dramatic urban growth. But documenting that change wasn't always the focus; some shooters used the form for contemplation as they wandered on foot, their work the visible transmission of their musings. The photographer became the flaneur, that traditional walker alert to all the city's paradoxes". —Andrea Gronvall

Dad #4 (Left Foot), 2012 © Odette England

"Although metropolises are key to many of this exhibit's entries, others take the viewer farther afield. In her project "Thrice Upon a Time," the Australian photographer Odette England shows the devastating impact the 1989 loss of their farm had on her family. In 2005 she returned to document her old home; in 2010 she invited her parents along, asking them to strap the large negatives of her 2005 photos under their feet as they walked the property. Scratched, punctured, and shredded, the negatives produced images that are literal records of tears in the family fabric". —Andrea Gronvall

Read the complete preview for Of Walking HERE.

JIM NAUGHTEN: THE IMPERIAL WAR MUSEUM

Contemporary Art and War, October 13 — February 24, 2014

Photographs from Jim Naughten's series, Re-enactors, were acquired by the Imperial War Museum's (London) permanent collection several years ago. They're now being shown in the museum's Manchester venue, as part of an exhibition entitled, Contemporary Art and War.

In this body of work, Naughten has photographed some of the thousands of people, who step out of their daily lives to transform into historical characters from the First and Second World Wars and re-enact battles and drills.  Naughten has investigated the phenomena of re-enactment culture with a formal photographic rigor, that contributes to the role of photography in reinventing history. 

Civilian with Black Fox Fur, 2008 © Jim Naughten

The striking detail of each image draws attention to the exactness of the costumes being worn, and to the expressions of the subjects. Titled only with reference to nationality, unit and rank—nothing of the real lives of the individuals is revealed. The viewer is compelled to look and to wonder about who chooses to play a WWI Gunner, a US Medic, a civilian or an SS Officer?

Inspired by Richard Avedon’s In The American West, Naughten has stripped away the context of the participants, heightening the sense of artifice, and through photographic technique, sublimated his subjects. These flawless photograph—that include tanks and battle scenes—chromatically echo photographs of the past, yet are undoubtedly contemporary.

Information about the exhibition can be found HERE.

The Re-enactors series can be viewed on the gallery website HERE.

REPRESENTATION ANNOUNCEMENT

We are delighted to announce, that we are now representing the complete works of Cara Barer on the East Coast of the US. A selection of artworks by Cara Barer had previously been available through Klompching Gallery's Print Room.

Cara Barer photographs outdated, abandoned and obsolete books, but only after transforming them into exquisite sculptural objects. Coiled and crumpled, they extend beyond an exploration of form, segueing into a commentary on the changing role of books, their state of flux in an increasingly digitized world, and ultimately their potential for ephemerality. The brilliance of the photographs lies in their ability to speak on multiple levels—through an understated interplay of content, design and color.

Over the course of the past decade, she has developed a sustained fine art practice, producing an ongoing series of richly-colored and highly detailed photographs. Cara Barer is increasingly and appropriately recognized for the employment of impeccable craftsmanship, a singular vision and an intimate knowledge of her subject and materials, by which she blurs the line between object and photograph. 

Cara Barer (b.1956) lives and works in Houston, Texas. She is a graduate of the Art Institute of Houston, the University of Houston and the Glassell School of Art. Barer has been represented in numerous exhibitions across the United States, and has had her work reproduced in several publications, including the recently released, Art Made From Books: Altered, Sculpted, Carved (Chronicle Books, 2013). Her artworks can be found in several private and public collections including Trump Hollywood, VISA, UCLA Special Collections, Danielle Steel, Bloomingdale's, Lehigh University, Nordstrom's Nationwide, Wells Fargo Bank and Museum of Fine Art, Houston.

MAX DE ESTEBAN: FEST FOTO 2013

Fest Foto in Porto Alegre, Brazil
October 8, 2013–May 12, 2014

Max de Esteban will be exhibiting photographs from his Proposition One and Proposition Three series at the Fest Foto in Brazil. His work will be shown in the Dialogos Internacionais section of the festival.

Proposition One was shown at the Klompching Gallery in October–December 2011, while Proposition Three was debuted at the AIPAD Photo Fair in March 2013.

At Once Sacrilegious and Sacred, 2012 © Max de Esteban

from the Proposition Three series

For further information about the Fest Foto, visit the website HERE.

Please note: we are currently updating the gallery website with more of Max de Esteban's work.

ODETTE ENGLAND: AT THE MoCP

'OF WALKING' EXHIBITION, OCTOBER 18—DECEMBER 20, 2013

We are pleased to share the news of Odette England's artworks being selected by Karen Irvine (Curator and Associate Director, MoCP), for inclusion in the Museum of Contemporary Photography's upcoming exhibition, Of Walking.

"The exhibition Of Walking  will explore the concept of thinking (while walking) made concrete via the camera's lens and other means. The scholarship behind the exhibition will include the history of photography in terms of its most famous walkers: from Atget to the street photographers of the 1950s and 60s like Garry Winogrand, to performance artists like Vito Acconci, who used walking and navigating outdoor space as a foundation for their documented performances. It will also address movements in art history that have dealt directly with walking, including the concept of the "dérive," (literally: "drifting"), or the unplanned tour through an urban landscape directed entirely by the feelings evoked in the individual by their surroundings in works such as those of Sohei Nishino or Simryn Gill. It will also include artists whose work draws attention to local social and political conditions through interaction and meandering through various landscapes, such as Paulien Oltheten, Odette England, and Hamish Fulton".—MoCP

Dad #1 (Left Foot), 2012 © Odette England

The Klompching Gallery has loaned eight photographs from Odette England's  Thrice Upon A Time series, first shown at the gallery in June-July, 2012. The artist was awarded the 2012 Project Launch Award by CENTER (Santa Fe) for the same series, and from which a selection was placed into the permanent collection of the George Eastman House, Rochester. 

Information about the exhibition at MoCP can be found HERE.

View the complete series of Thrice Upon A Time HERE.

CPW PRINT AUCTION

In partnership with  three of our gallery artists, we're pleased to support the Center for Photography at Woodstock's annual photography benefit auction.

Art Auction and Gala

Honorary Co-Chairs: Howard Greenberg, Jed Root, Stan Sagner
Auctioneer: Daile Kaplan of Swann Auction Galleries

Saturday, October 19, 4:00pm–8:00pm

Diamon Mills Hotel & Tavern, Saugerties, NY

Photographs have been donated by Cornelia Hediger, Lisa M. Robinson and Ken Rosenthal.

Exit, 2006 © Cornelia Hediger

Silver Gelatin Print, Edition: AP, 16" x 20", Estimate: $1,500

Etching, 2010 © Lisa M. Robinson

C-Type, Edition: 1/10, 32" x 40", Estimate: $2,570

A Dream Half Remembered #RBC-49-7/8, 2005 © Ken Rosenthal

Split-toned Silver Gelatin Print, Edition: 2/25, 15" x 15", Estimate: $2,000

"Founded in 1977, the Center for Photography at Woodstock supports artists working in photography and related media, and engages audiences through offerings in which creation, discovery and learning are made possible. CPW was recently awarded the Spotlight Award at the 8th Annual Lucie Awards on October 2010 for having 'significantly altered the landscape of photography'. Past awrdees for this recognition iclude the W. Eugene Smith Foudnation, Visa Pour l'Image and Magnum Photos".—CPW

Tickets for the event are available online here.
View the online auction catalogue here.