Exhibition dates: 5th October 2013 - 19th January 2014
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This is (our) reality.
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Many thankx to the De Pont museum of contemporary art for allowing me to publish the photographs in the posting. Please click on the photographs for a larger version of the image.
*PLEASE NOTE THIS POSTING CONTAINS ART PHOTOGRAPHS OF FEMALE NUDITY – IF YOU DO NOT LIKE PLEASE DO NOT LOOK, FAIR WARNING HAS BEEN GIVEN*
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Philip-Lorca diCorcia
Norfolk
1979
Fujicolor Crystal Archive print
16 x 20 inches (40.6 x 50.8 cm)
Courtesy the artist and David Zwirner, New York/London
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Philip-Lorca diCorcia
Marilyn; 28 years old; Las Vegas, Nevada; $30
1990-92
© Philip-Lorca diCorcia, Courtesy David Zwirner, New York/London
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Philip-Lorca diCorcia
Ike Cole, 38 years old, Los Angeles, California, $25
1990-92
Fujicolor Crystal Archive print
30 x 40 inch (111.8 x 167.6 cm)
© Courtesy of the artist and David Zwirner, New York and Sprüth Magers, London/Berlin
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Philip-Lorca diCorcia
Eddie Anderson, 21 years old, Houston, Texas, $ 20
1990-92
Fujicolor Crystal Archive print
30 x 40 inches (76.2 x 101.6 cm)
Courtesy the artist and David Zwirner, New York/London
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Philip-Lorca diCorcia
New York
1993
Ektacolor print
30 x 40 inches (76.2 x 101.6 cm)
Courtesy the artist and David Zwirner, New York/London
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Philip-Lorca diCorcia
Wellfleet
1993
Fujicolor Crystal Archive print
41.3 x 51.8 cm
© Courtesy of the artist and David Zwirner, New York/London
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Philip-Lorca diCorcia
Hong Kong
1996
Ektacolor print
25 x 37 1/2 inches (63.50 x 95.25 cm)
Courtesy the artist, and David Zwirner, New York/London
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Philip-Lorca diCorcia
New York City
1996
Fujicolor Crystal Archive print
16 1/4 x 20 3/8 inches (41.3 x 51.8 cm)
© Courtesy of the artist and David Zwirner, New York/London
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“Starting October 5, 2013 De Pont museum of contemporary art is hosting the first European survey of the oeuvre of US photographer Philip-Lorca diCorcia. Born in 1951, diCorcia is one of the most important and influential contemporary photographers. His images oscillate between everyday elements and arrangements that are staged down to the smallest detail. In his works, seemingly realistic images that are taken with an ostensibly documentary eye are undermined by their highly elaborate orchestration. This exhibition is organized in collaboration with Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt.
One of the primary issues that diCorcia addresses is the question of whether it is possible to depict reality, and this is what links his photographs, most of which he creates as series. For Hustlers (1990-1992), for example, he took pictures of male prostitutes in meticulously staged settings, while in what is probably his most famous series, Heads (2000-2001), he captured an instant in the everyday lives of unsuspecting passers‐by. Alongside the series Streetwork (1993-1999), Lucky 13 (2004) and A Storybook Life (1975-1999), the exhibition at the Schirn, which was organized in close collaboration with the artist, will also present works from his new and ongoing East of Eden (2008-) project for the first time.
In addition, the work Thousand (2007) will also be on show in Tilburg. This installation consisting of 1,000 Polaroid’s, which are considered one complete work, offers a distinctive vantage point into the artist’s sensibility and visual preoccupations. Seen alongside Polaroid’s from some of diCorcia’s most recognized bodies of work and distinctive series - Hustlers, Streetwork, Heads, Lucky Thirteen – are intimate scenes with friends, family members, and lovers; self portraits; double-exposures; test shots from commercial and fashion shoots; the ordinary places of everyday life, such as airport lounges, street corners, bedrooms; and still life portraits of common objects, including clocks and lamps.
For the Hustlers series (1990-1992), diCorcia shot photographs of male prostitutes along Santa Monica Boulevard in Hollywood. The artist carefully staged the protagonists’ positions as well as the setting and the accompanying lighting. The titles of the respective photographs make reference to the name, age, and birthplace of the men as well as the amount of money diCorcia paid them for posing and which they typically receive for their sexual services. Staged in Tinseltown, the Hollywood district of Los Angeles, the hustlers become the touching performers of their own lost dreams.
The streets of New York, Tokyo, Paris, London, Mexico City, or Los Angeles are the setting for diCorcia’s Streetwork series. Produced between 1993 and 1999, passers-by walk into the artist’s photo trap on their way home, to work, to the gym, or to the grocery store, unsuspectingly passing through diCorcia’s arranged photoflash system. The photographer releases the shutter at a certain moment, “freezing” it in time. DiCorcia has time stand still in the hustle and bustle of big-city life and shifts individuals and groups of people into the center of events. In much the same way as in Hustlers, what counts here is not the documentary character of the work; instead, diCorcia poses the question: What is reality?
The artist heightens this focus on the individual in his subsequent series, Heads (2000-2001), for which he selected seventeen heads out of a total of some three thousand photographs. The viewer’s gaze is directed toward the face of the passer-by, who is moved into the center of the image by means of the lighting and the pictorial detail. The rest remains in shadowy darkness. The individuals – a young woman, a tourist, a man wearing a suit and tie – seem strangely isolated, almost lonely, their gazes otherworldly. DiCorcia turns the inside outward and for a brief moment elevates the individual above the crowd. The artist produces a profound intimacy.
With Streetwork and Heads, diCorcia treads a very individual path of street photography, which in America looks back at a long tradition established by artists such as Walker Evans, Robert Frank, or Diane Arbus. He reinvents the seemingly chance moment and transfers it into the present.
The painterly quality of diCorcia’s photographs, which is produced by means of dramatic lighting, becomes particularly evident in the series Lucky 13 (2004). The artist captures the athletic, naked bodies of pole dancers in the midst of a falling motion. The women achieve a sculptural plasticity by means of the strong lighting and the almost black background, and seem to have been chiselled in stone. Although the title of the series, an American colloquialism used to ward off a losing streak, makes reference to theseamy milieu of strip joints, the artist is not seeking to create a milieu study or celebrate voyeurism. Instead, the performers become metaphors for impermanence, luck, or the moment they begin to fall, suggesting the notion of “fallen angels.”
DiCorcia also includes a religious element in his most recent works, the series East of Eden, a work in progress that is being published for the first time in the catalogue accompanying the exhibition. Besides the biblical inspiration, which the title underscores, a literary connection can furthermore be made to the eponymous novel by John Steinbeck, which relates the story of Cain and Abel in the form of an American family saga set between the period of the Civil War and World War I. In his choice of motifs, diCorcia makes use of iconographic visual worlds: an apple tree in all its tantalizing glory, a blind married couple sitting at the dining table, a landscape photograph that leads us into endless expanses.
DiCorcia deals intensely with the motif of the figure in his oeuvre. His compact compositions are marked by a non-dialogue between people and their environment or between individual protagonists. The motifs captured in compositional variations in most of the series feature painterly qualities. Subtly arranged and falling back on a complex orchestration of the lighting, the visual worlds created by the American manifest social realities in an almost poetic way. The emotionally and narratively charged works are complex nexuses of iconographic allusions to and depictions of contemporary American society.”
Press release from the De Pont website
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Philip-Lorca diCorcia
Head #10
2001
Fujicolor Crystal Archive print
48 x 60 inches (121.9 x 152.4 cm)
Courtesy the artist and David Zwirner, New York/London
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Philip-Lorca diCorcia
Head #11
2001
Fujicolor Crystal Archive print
48 x 60 inches (121.9 x 152.4 cm)
Collection De Pont museum of contemporary art, Courtesy the artist and David Zwirner, New York/London
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Philip-Lorca diCorcia
Head #23
2001
Fujicolor Crystal Archive print
48 x 60 inches (121.9 x 152.4 cm)
© Courtesy of the artist and David Zwirner, New York/London
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Philip-Lorca diCorcia
Lola
2004
Fujicolor Crystal Archive print
64 1/2 x 44 1/2 inches (163.8 x 113 cm)
Courtesy the artist and David Zwirner, New York/London
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Philip-Lorca diCorcia
Juliet Ms. Muse
2004
Fujicolor Crystal Archive print
64 1/2 x 44 1/2 inches (163.8 x 113 cm)
Courtesy the artist and David Zwirner, New York/London
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Philip-Lorca diCorcia
The Hamptons
2008
Inkjet print
40 x 60 inches (101.6 x 152.4 cm)
Courtesy the artist and David Zwirner, New York/London
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Philip-Lorca diCorcia
Sylmar, California
2008
Inkjet print
56 x71 inches (142.2 x 180.3 cm)
Collection De Pont museum of contemporary art, Courtesy the artist and David Zwirner, New York/London
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De Pont museum of contemporary art
Wilhelminapark 1
5041 EA Tilburg
Opening hours:
Tuesday through Sunday 11 am – 5 pm
De Pont museum of contemporary art website
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Filed under: American, american photographers, beauty, colour photography, digital photography, documentary photography, exhibition, existence, gallery website, intimacy, landscape, light, London, memory, New York, photographic series, photography, Polaroid photography, portrait, psychological, reality, sculpture, space, time, works on paper Tagged: A Storybook Life, American colloquialism, American family saga, American street photography, Cain and Abel, contemporary American society, De Pont Museum of Contemporary Art, Diane Arbus, diCorcia Hustlers, East of Eden, Eddie Anderson 21 years old, Ektacolor print, fallen angels, female nudity, Hollywood, Hollywood hustlers, Hustlers, iconographic visual worlds, Ike Cole 38 years old, impermanence, intimacy, intimacy in photography, John Steinbeck, John Steinbeck East of Eden, Juliet Ms. Muse, luck, Lucky 13, Philip-Lorca diCorcia, Philip-Lorca diCorcia A Storybook Life, Philip-Lorca diCorcia East of Eden, Philip-Lorca diCorcia Eddie Anderson 21 years old, Philip-Lorca diCorcia Head #10, Philip-Lorca diCorcia Head #11, Philip-Lorca diCorcia Head #23, Philip-Lorca diCorcia Heads, Philip-Lorca diCorcia Hong Kong 1996, Philip-Lorca diCorcia Ike Cole 38 years old, Philip-Lorca diCorcia Juliet Ms. Muse, Philip-Lorca diCorcia Lola, Philip-Lorca diCorcia Lucky 13, Philip-Lorca diCorcia Marilyn, Philip-Lorca diCorcia Marilyn; 28 Years Old, Philip-Lorca diCorcia New York 1993, Philip-Lorca diCorcia New York City 1996, Philip-Lorca diCorcia Norfolk 1979, Philip-Lorca diCorcia Streetwork, Philip-Lorca diCorcia Sylmar California, Philip-Lorca diCorcia The Hamptons, Philip-Lorca diCorcia Thousand, Philip-Lorca diCorcia Wellfleet, Philip-Lorca diCorcia Wellfleet 1993, polaroid, pole dancers, portraiture, reality, reality in photography, Robert Frank, Santa Monica Boulevard, sculptural plasticity, still life portraits, still life portraits of common objects, street photography, street photography in America, The Hamptons, Tilburg, time-freeze, Tinseltown, Walker Evans, What is reality?