In Context: Diego Arraigada. © MAS Context.
This contribution is part of “In Context,” a series that features guest curators who browse the archives of MAS Context, uncovering new relationships between articles and establishing new topics.
Photographs
“There is something abominable about cameras, because they possess the power to invent many worlds.
—Robert Smithson, “Art through the Camera’s Eye.”
I want to propose to the reader a drift through the beauty and the poignancy of some of the photographic essays that regularly appear in each issue of MAS Context. Usually they relate to the theme that is being treated. However, sometimes this relationship is not an obvious one, but rather an ambiguous, blurry or even contradictory one: it is in these last ones that I am interested in because they open the door to the unexpected and new. If the written articles give an insight and define the position of the authors in relation to a specific topic, the photographic articles are the place for multiple readings and open interpretations; they can ultimately articulate the unsaid.
Consider the work of Yosigo in the context of the “Amusement” issue and the perplexity his pictures can produce in the viewer–for there is nothing amusing on them. Andrew Bush’s “Vector Portraits” may seem appropriate to illustrate the theme of “Speed,” except for their stillness is so well achieved that one has to look very carefully to detect traces of movement. “Suburbia gone wild,” by Martin Adolfsson, deals with the global landscape of the new middle class suburban owners that paradoxically don’t seem to own an individual identity. David Schalliol’s “Isolated Buildings” makes us think about the relevance of “Work” as a powerful counter entropic force by showing the effects of its absence. The energy of a live performance stage seems to be very well captured in “Staged Energy” images, by Chris Martin and Cesar Russ. But where does their melancholy come from? Perhaps-as in every photograph-from trying to grasp a live instant in time and turn it into something frozen and eternal.
EMPTY AMUSEMENT
Photography by Yosigo.
Issue 6 | AMUSEMENT SUMMER 10
VECTOR PORTRAITS
Photography by Andrew Bush.
Issue 11 | SPEED FALL 11
SUBURBIA GONE WILD
Text and photographs by Martin Adolfsson.
Issue 13 | OWNERSHIP SPRING 12
ISOLATED BUILDING STUDIES
Photography by David Schalliol.
Issue 3 | WORK FALL 09
STAGED ENERGY
PhotographY by Chris Martin and Cesar Russ.
Issue 5 | ENERGY SPRING 10