Flesh and Stone, a Conversation, the collaboration project between photographers Andy Romanoff and Scot Sothern on view at California State University in Los Angeles, stakes out new ground in the space between content based photography and the conceptual art piece. By taking photographs made independently and without intention to be seen together and juxtaposing them, they have created a powerful dialog between the previously unrelated pieces.
Romanoff and Sothern didn’t set out to work together. Best known for photographing streetwalkers and Skid Row denizens, Sothern’s most recent work was his Drive-By Shootings photographs, pictures made while working in places no one wants to go, shooting mainly from his car. Romanoff had been making images of sacred statues from many faiths as part of a long-term project called 15000 Buddhas. Both are veteran photographers who share a love for photography but their visions and way of working couldn’t be more different. Nonetheless when they talked, they frequently discussed how the emotional content of their pictures seemed to be similar, even with vastly different visual content. They started to talk about what would happen if they displayed their pictures in pairs, creating a conversation between these representations of the sacred and the humanity they were intended to speak to.
In 2016, they set out to test their theory. Pulling together a few hundred pictures from each of their collections, they looked for pairs of images that resonated with each other and soon found some that made them both say “That pair!” The Flesh and Stone project is the result of that afternoon. Pairing thirty-six pictures, eighteen from each of them, and hanging the pairs side by side, they have made an arresting display. The conversation between the images gave each a richer meaning and the pairs take on their own life as works of art separate and distinct from the pictures seen alone.
Flesh and Stone, a Conversation
September 7th, 2017 through January 10th, 2018
Cal State Dominguez Hills
California State University
5151 State University Dr
Los Angeles, CA 90032
USA
