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| Photo: Alec Soth |
Matt Black displays square photographs from his latest book American Geography which concentrates on the poverty he's documented throughout the US. Digital photography does not often translate well into B&W; it doesn't have the 'infinite' shades of nuanced whites, subtle greys and sublime blacks found in film- and therefore lacks its classic beauty. But Black seems to have found his particular style and language in the B&W digital realm, he prints dark and deep, reminiscent of de Carava, avoids digital highlight blow outs, and while his prints are tack sharp, they also maintain a grainy, somewhat dream like, Holgaesque type character.
Alec Soth's A Pound of Pictures is not the best work I've seen by him, some of them (literally) being just very large snapshots of very many snapshots. Still, he had at least three photographs that really appeal to me: one is a massive shot of an Asian woman taking a selfie at Niagra Falls, a close up of a rather tattered butterfly on a piece of fruit, and a beautiful shot of some wild sunflowers set against a blue sky with puffy clouds.
PS- Oh, and the woman at the desk at the Fraenkel actually says, "Hello" upon entering- a very different experience from NYC galleries where visitors and attendants actively glare at each other (should eyes per chance lock).
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| Photo: Matt Black |
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