Bing Wright’s work has always been an exploration of perspectives, materials and shapes. This latest exhibition marks the photographer’s return to color, not seen since his first series Windows (1989), where the viewer peered through symmetrical window frames set against against a white background to see landscapes distorted by rain, fog and dust.
In the vein of Fly Disasters (1993 and 1997), The Rose Pictures, Wet Glass (1995) and Newspaper Falling (2004), Broken Mirror / Evening Sky experiments with a recurring pattern: large photographs of sunsets seen through the distorting prism of a broken mirror. Each fragment of the mirror seems to contain a different color of the exploding sky, breaking down the spectrum of light and giving the appearance of relief to these two-dimensional sculptures. The black lines running along the fissured pewter surface are like the branching trees in the foreground of classical representations, blocking out the abstract horizon with a mundane element.
This series is being exhibited alongside another piece, Silver on Mirror, a monumental black-and-white still life composed with silver chips and printed on wallpaper. These two series are a literal study of the things necessary to photography development: glass, light and silver. With their monumental size, they force the viewer to contemplation, as do the three “film rolls” presented under glass. Meters of forest landscapes and still lifes that seem to unroll endlessly, they invite viewers to lose themselves in the details as one does with Japanese prints.
Broken Mirror / Evening Sky
Bing Wright
December 10 – January 18, 2014
Paula Cooper Gallery
534 West 21st Street
10011 New York
USA
T. 212.255.1105
http://www.paulacoopergallery.com
http://www.bingwright.net
