MITCHELL: Abstracts, 2011, Archival Pigment prints - 36 x 36 (44 x 44 inch paper size) - A Solo Exhibition at the RMA Institute, Bangkok, Thailand opens May 21 at 4:30 pm. Concurrently, works from this collection will be available from Lynn Dunham Fine Art in the United States.

ABOUT THE WORK: Mitchell’s Abstracts 2011 collection is comprised of 39 images which follow the rudiments of Concretism, a non-objective art form of the 1940’s that defied all the norms of the Contemporary Art of its time. The central characteristic of this art movement produced works without the influence of any external factors, such as nature, people, or things. By definition, Concrete Art does not require the artist to have a definitive concept or subject. It is about the inventive play of lines, planes, and color, forming unspecific patterns and true expression of an artist's spirit. It is this movement which gave birth to Constructivism, Suprematism and Neo-Concretism, Minimalism and Op Art, all periods in art history which are embodied in Mitchell’s work since his departure from the commercial arena. He has recently employed the process of creating assemblages which he chronicles through the lens putting a contemporary spin on the principles art movements of the past century.

Mitchell’s prominent and innate sensibility is clearly related and is presented particularly in the culmination of two years’ work with the Abstracts 2011 collection, a portion of which has been selected to be exhibited in this solo at the RMA Institute. With his fresh perspective, he employs a 21st century point of view and establishes a new personal archetype. Mitchell states, “The conventional notion that photography is about representation is/has been rejected in favor of pure abstraction. The images themselves along with the process of image making are the subject rather than the depiction of something identifiable.”

DIVERGENCE

at

the Sande Webster Gallery

Five Views On Photography In the main gallery July 2 - August 28, 2010

RECEPTION: Friday, July 9, 2010, 6-8pm

LOCATION: 2006 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19103 - (215) 636-9003

http://www.sandewebstergallery.com/

This summer the Sande Webster Gallery presents Divergence: Five Views on Photography. This exhibitionexplores diverse approches to the photographic medium. As the field continually evolves to incorporate digital technologies, artists are finding freedom from traditional processes and new creative opportunities for personaland aesthetic expression. This contemporary photography exhibition begins a dialog about the current and future state of the printed photographic image. Divergence showcases the work of Krantz, Love, Mitchell, Stein and Tarver.Gregg Krantz is a Philadelphia artist with a graphic sensibility expressed through a love of printmaking,photography and design.

Krantz’s recent photographic works are abstract narratives that document surfaces and patterns indicative of particular places. His close-up, detailed photographs capture the texture, color and quality of light in his West Philadelphia neighborhood as well as his travels abroad. Through subject matter and rhythmic phrasing in each series, Krantz heightens one’s perception of the invisible dimension of time. His photographs ofurban facades, geometric forms and painted surfaces are transformed into a personal vocabulary that are arrangedin series, like musical compositions, in varying qualities of tone and harmony.

Arlene Love is an accomplished figurative sculptor turned street photographer. She has been working on anongoing photographic project called Walking Distance over the past few years. She doesn’t search for exotic newplaces and people to photograph. Her camera goes with her as she goes about her life within walking distanceof her home. The people on the streets of Philadelphia are as interesting to her now as were those in Mexicowhere she lived for many years. Nothing is more interesting to Arlene Love than simply watching people – exceptphotographing them when they are blissfully unaware of her presence. Love has exhibited her work both nationally and internationally, and is in the collections of the Philadelphia Museum of Art and The Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts.

Mitchell rejects the assumption that photography is about representation. Pure abstraction and the process ofimage making are the subject of his work. His photographs have more in common with the sensory experiencesassociated with color field paintings and ambient sound than they do with the tradition of photography. Images areshot with the purest of intuition and from a perspective largely influenced by aura occurrences associated withTemporal Lobe Epilepsy. Auras can produce heightened abstract emotions, affecting the visual field. Concepts and meanings in words that might invigorate the imagination, or perhaps for the intellect alone are explored in his titles, which enhance the imagery. While the experience with auras, is not always evident in the result, it is irrefutably connected in the process of creation.

Phil Stein creates dimensional photographic collages of the urban landscape. He finds inspiration in the random visual fragmentation that occasionally occurs in live streams and video downloads. The Streets series explores various themes of image reconstruction based on these common algorithmic accidents. Digital processes are used with a variety of fine papers to create this body of photo-based work. The resulting artwork is a combination of photograph, collage and sculpture. The world through Stein’s digital lens is made up of bits of visual information. He creates a new way of seeing the world around us, defining what it means to be an artist in the digital age.

Ron Tarver began his recent series of ethereal black and white flower portraits as a journey through his ownbackyard. Beginning the first day of the season, Tarver set out to document the spring flowers of the Northeast,beginning with crocuses then on to the next blooms, such as magnolia and tulips. Tarver captures the beauty ofnature in such intimate detail. There is a sensuality to these images that is revealed in the graceful curves of eachpetal. Tarver is a master at his craft and presents sumptuous images that remind us how incredible our naturalworld truly is. Tarver, a 2001 Pew Fellow, is included in the collections of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Oklahoma Museum of History and the National Museum of American Art of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington DC.

The Edge of Vision: The Rise of Abstraction in Photography

APERTURE
Text by Lyle Rexer

From the beginning, abstraction has been intrinsic to photography, and its persistent popularity reveals much about the medium. The Edge of Vision: The Rise of Abstraction in Photography is the first book in English to document this phenomenon and to put it into historical context, while also examining the diverse approaches thriving within contemporary photography. Author Lyle Rexer examines abstraction at pivotal moments, starting with the inception of photography, when many of the pioneers believed the camera might reveal other aspects of reality. The Edge of Vision traces subsequent explorations--from the Photo Secessionists, who emphasized process and emotional expression over observed reality, to Modernist and Surrealist experiments. In the decades to follow, in particular from the 1940s through the 1980s, a multitude of photographers--Edward Weston, Aaron Siskind and Barbara Kasten among them--took up abstraction from a variety of positions. Finally, Rexer explores the influence the history of abstraction exerts on contemporary thinking about the medium. Many contemporary artists--most prominently Ilan Wolff, Marco Breuer and Ellen Carey--reject photography's documentary dimension in favor of other possibilities, somewhere between painting and sculpture, that include the manipulation of process and printing. In addition to Rexer's engagingly written and richly illustrated history, this volume includes a selection of primary texts from and interviews with key practitioners and critics such as Edward Steichen, László Moholy-Nagy and James Welling.

ABOUT THE BOOK COVER: Bill Armstrong's work featured on the cover of Rexer's latest book

The Mandala photographs are loosely based on Buddhist paintings known as mandalas. Mandalas are concentric circles of images that depict central themes in Buddhism, such as the Wheel of Life or the Map of the Cosmos. Through abstraction, simplification and blur, I hope to create a context for the exploration of these broad spiritual themes that, rather than relying on a codified system, remains open and invites the viewer's personal interpretation.
Like the other portfolios in the Infinity series, the Mandalas are made from collages that have been photographed with the camera's focusing ring set on infinity. Extreme defocusing allows me to create rhapsodies of color that change as one gazes into them: they pulsate as if alive. This sense of "being" within the inanimate invites an inquiry into the idea of the interconnectedness of all things.

Whether seen as celestial spheres, imaginary objects, or microscopic details, the Mandalas are meant to be meditative pieces--glimpses into a space of pure color, beyond our focus, beyond our ken. Their essential purpose is to create a sense of transcendence, of radiance, of pure joy!