In describing the transformative aspects of his iPhone camera, Rob Pruitt cites the familiar analogy of Muybridge's early photographs, which captured every second of a particular motion in order to convey a sense of continuity. For Pruitt, noted for project-based works that reference pop-cultural phenomena, this particular capacity of the trendy albeit pricey Apple device has had a similar, transformative impact on the way he views the world around him. This exhibition, “iPhotos,” attempts to convince the viewer of these revolutionary aspects with an installation that literally overwhelms, a physical manifestation of what the artist describes as his personal experience.
“IPhotos” seems as much a state-of-the-union address on photography, however, as it does on technology. Muybridge references aside, Pruitt’s subject matter ranges from high cultural (Gustave Courbet’s The Origin of the World, 1866, makes several notable appearances) to quotidian (repeated images of events that might seem insignificant to those without access to the artist’s personal experience). The contrast of high and low is only the most superficial of the exhibition’s connections, however; on further reflection, the viewer is forced to consider both the qualitative and quantitative importance of the anecdotal snapshot and the implications of attaching personal and cultural value to the Courbet as opposed to, for instance, multiple shots of a pan of brownies Pruitt presumably enjoyed a few weeks back. If most of the images on view matter primarily to Pruitt, is their value to us sentimental, aesthetic, or otherwise? The nature of the installation, in which photographs appear floor to ceiling—in some instances serially—throughout several rooms, enhances their immediacy, as well as the ambiguity of the relationship between each and to the artist himself. This mass physicality illuminates the developing relationship between technology, disposable images, and the acutely personal experiences they are designed to depict. — Britany Salsbury
and press release
Quote:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Rob Pruitt
iPhotos
September 13 – October 11, 2008
Reception and book signing: September 13, 6 – 8PM
About three years ago I saw a comedian on late night television making a joke about how cellular phones are now cameras. “What will they be able to do next,” the comedian asked. “Toast bread?” I remember laughing and agreeing. Last year, charmed like a snake, by Steve Jobs, I found myself standing in line outside an Apple store waiting to buy a phone that not only took pictures but did a gazillion other things too.
Before I got my iPhone, my address book was a physical Rolodex, my iPod was an old Walkman, and I never checked my e-mail—I was a digital mess. Nate Lowman tried to teach me how to “text” once and it was so confusing that I felt like his grandpa. The iPhone changed all of that for me. I feel like I have an extra brain in my pocket now and I can send text messages like Paris. Any fact or figure that I’m grasping is seconds away. All I have to do is pull it out and click on Wikipedia.
But above all, it’s a fantastic high-tech Moleskine® for me. It is a diary for someone who doesn’t write and a sketchbook for someone who doesn’t draw. At first, I would take pictures as a record, the way you jot down ideas in a notebook—to remember stuff, visually.
Then the activity became compulsive and I couldn’t stop. Just as there was no end to my life—no pause—there was always something else to record, something more to put in my digital net. Always the art-making pragmatist, I decided to go with the flow. I was taking pictures and making art on autopilot. Wherever I go, like Uncle Andy with his wife Sony, I snap away with my phone, recording my days. I became intoxicated by the speed of image making and the patterns of sequential images that resulted. Each day’s iPhone Camera Roll would represent one long Muybridge sequence, or more apropos, like a comic book of my life, a never-ending-time capsule book.
The loves of my life rubs shoulders with the loves of others’, the poignant spread thin across this year and the next. It is as easy as blinking. Ultimately my life, my visual life, is being sucked down into my little hand-sized brain. I wish I had two—one for each hand. There is still so much more life out there.
A venue for posting intrinsically banal photographs, especially snapshots, of any subject matter that captures everyday life, EXCEPT for any and all living creatures including humans.
some images
even the display doesn't look exiting .....
something Monet's Les Nymphéas display would have been much more interesting, IMHO .......
one of the image you will find in this exhibition .....
09-10-2008
Linear Mode
