In an age of democratization of imaging technology, we are all at once photographer and subject. This is ever more so during a global pandemic endured with practices of social distancing, quarantine and isolation. On closeness, Robert Capa famously said, “If your pictures aren’t good enough, you didn’t get close enough.” The insistence on proximity is nonetheless qualified by “enough”, an intuitive call on the material space, relational dynamic and affective state of the situation. Centred around the play of distance, Closer is a group exhibition featuring nine living and late artists who work with an expanded field of portrait photography in different eras. Artists critically mediate their physical and psychological distance with subjects and sitters. For distance, now more than ever, is a gesture of care.
Pixy Liao, Photographer and Her Muse, 2014, C-print, 75 x 100 cm, Edition of 3
Nobuyoshi Araki, Sentimental Journey, 1971, Gelatin silver print, 21.9 x 32.9 cm
Nadav Kander, Donald Trump I, New York, USA, 2016, 2016, Pigment print, 66 x 51.5 cm, Edition 5 + 2AP
Lai Lon Hin, bells and whistles, 2021, Single channel video, 3’15” , Edition of 5
Liu Zheng, Two Homeless Boys, Beijing, 1998, Archival inkjet print, Edition of 20
Daido Moriyama, Japan, A Photo Theater, 1968, Gelatin silver print, 50.8 x 61 cm
Ren Hang, Untitled 59, 2014, C-print, 67 x 100 cm, Edition of 10
Yau Leung, Untitled, 1960 – 70s, Vintage gelatin silver print, 35.5 x 28 cm
Zhang Haier, Lune Violette, Guangzhou, 2007, 2007, C-print, 75 x 100cm, Edition of 10
(Image courtesy of artist and Blindspot Gallery)
