Senigallia Città della Fotografia (Senigallia, the City of Photography) continues its commitment to promoting and enhancing the work of great international photographers, dedicating a new exhibition to Sandy Skoglund: the renowned American artist known for her colorful and evocative works. In her art, fantasy engages with reality in a game of surreal and unsettling contrasts.
From November 23rd, 2023 to June 2nd, 2024, the rooms of Palazzo del Duca host the retrospective exhibition “Sandy Skoglund: The Imaginary Worlds of Photography, 1974-2023.”
This exhibition retraces the career of an artist who captures the rich environmental installations she creates by her favourite expressive medium: photography. . These installations are composed of everyday objects, materials designed and manufactured by Skoglund herself, as well as small and medium-sized sculptures specifically created for this imaginative landscapes. All of her works have a quite long projecting period, as Skoglund spends months, sometimes years, studying and recreating eachdetail of the installation that will be later photographed. She employs strong chromatic contrasts that make the scenes even more fantastical and surreal.
As the artist herself stated, “Without photography, conceptual art would be erased from the memory of mankind. In this form, my art can be perceived as a painting, as an open window to another world. This, on the other hand, is the reason why I work with a camera. The large format fits well with the joking aspect of my work.”
The exhibition in Senigallia tells the phases of Sandy Skoglund’s activity, from the 70’s as started taking photographs as a self-taught artist, to her first major successes in the 1980s: “Radioactive cats” and “Revenge of the goldfish” featuring her now iconic fluorescent animals. Moreover, her famous works of the 1990s, such as “Atomic Love” and “The cocktail party” where the installations become increasingly rich and complex with human figures and statues living in silent dialogues.
“Winter“, is her latest work, a projectshe worked on from 2008 to 2018, which required years of experimentation and attempts and where she implemented new techniques and digital processes focused on the image of a snowflake considered “a hybrid of techniques and concepts both immortalized by the camera on December 22nd, 2018. In contrast to the quick snapshot, Winter is a study of perseverance and persistence, an artificial landscape that celebrates the beautiful and frightening qualities of the coldest season,” as Skoglund explains.
“It is a true pleasure,” commented the Mayor of Senigallia, Massimo Olivetti, and the Deputy Mayor and Councilor of Culture, Riccardo Pizzi, “to host the exhibition of Sandy Skoglund in the halls of Palazzo del Duca, an artist of undeniable charm, who fits well into the international programm of exhibitions that we are proposing for Senigallia, the City of Photography. Our City continues to distinguish itself more and more in the sophisticated search for new photographic techniques and languages to portray the contemporary world of this ancient medium, with the work of renowned artists and projects specifically designed for our exhibition spaces. Sandy Skoglund’s exhibition represents another piece that enriches the cultural calendar of Senigallia, confirming and strengthening its image on a national and international level.”
“Winter” is the central focus of the exhibition in Senigallia: in addition to the photograph itself, the exhibition will recreate the setting of its creation, with the backgrounds and some of the original sculptures used by Skoglund, allowing visitors to literally step into the artwork and discover up closely the meticulous details and the incredible work that lies what may seem to be an instantaneous shot.
Exhibition curated by Mario Trevisan and Paci Contemporary
The exhibition is also promoted by a catalogue published by Danilo Montanari Editore.
Sandy Skoglund : The Imaginary Worlds of Photography. 1970-2023
23rd November 2023 – 2nd June 2024
Palazzo del Duca, Senigallia
Piazza del Duca, 1
60019 Senigallia AN, Italy
https://www.feelsenigallia.it/da-vedere/monumenti/palazzo-del-duca-e-fontana-delle-anatre.html
