The Sean Kelly Asia gallery presents the exhibition Built Images as of May 18th, on the 40-year career of artist James Casebere. Photographs that evoke empty and abandoned spaces while suggesting future events, arousing the spectator’s imagination, each person creates their own narrative.
Casebere was pioneer in his field and, as member of Pictures Generation, he foreshadowed what would later be known as “staged photography”. In his work offer, the artist does research and builds architectural, historical, artistic, and cinematographic proposals.
The presentation shows the way in which his early works lacked color, like the first black and white movies, which causes a dramatic emotional effect. In Venice Ghetto, 1985, he creates dynamic lighting effects, while eliminating strange details from the piece, and provoking feelings and memories, thanks to the architectural spaces he fabricates. In the 2000’s decade, his work went down another path, his interest manifested in a wide range of international architectural spaces, including the flooded space in the Yellow Hallway, inspired by a stairway in Versailles.
His latest works have a strong tendency towards Luis Barragán; they include the use of color, dramatic light, and smooth surfaces that evoke an austerity reminiscent, in a way, of Casebere’s first work series.
Cover: Yellow Hallway #2, 2001, framed Cibachrome (dye destruction) print.