Richard Misrach
December 3-January 25, 2006
Opening reception: Saturday, December 3, 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m.
Marc Selwyn Fine Art is pleased to announce an exhibition of new work by Richard Misrach. This is Richard’s fist solo show in Los Angeles since 2003.
Richard Misrach is one of the most influential and internationally recognized photographers working today. He is best known for his epic project on the deserts of the American West. By exploring the social, political, environmental, and cultural characteristics of the places he photographs, he has expanded the notion of traditional landscape photographic practice. His subjects have included manmade floods and fires, military bombing ranges, mass graves of dead animals, sublime night skies, and details of paintings housed in the museums of the Southwest.
This exhibition consists of large-scale color prints of individuals and groups of figures engaged in the leisurely pleasures of the ocean. The remarkable formal beauty of the prints stands in contrast to the disquieting perspective created by the camera’s surveying eye. Isolated swimmers float away, Ophelia-like, across a vast expanse. A lone figure in the middle of the ocean peers into the water’s depth. Three covered figures are etched into the sand, identified by their colorful towels, each in their own world. At once playful and enigmatic, the images retain a certain ambiguity characteristic of Misrach’s work.
Richard Misrach has exhibited extensively in the United States and abroad. His work is represented in many permanent collections including the Museum of Modern Art, New York, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, The Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, The National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C., the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, California, and The Getty Museum of Art, California. Misrach is a recipient of numerous awards including a Guggenheim Fellowship and four National Endowment for the Arts Fellowships. In 2001, he received the Knight Purchase Award for Photographic Media from the Akron Art Museum, and in 2002, the Kulturpreis for Lifetime Achievement in Photography from the German Society of Photography. He lives in Berkeley, California, with his wife, Myriam.
Marc Selwyn Fine Art is open Tuesday through Saturday, 11:00 am to 6:00 pm.