Richard Caldicott and Luuk de Haan - Group Show “Prime Time” Archetypes of Abstraction in Photography
Jun 21, 2016
Photography has given us the ability to perfectly capture images of what’s visible to our eyes. But what exactly is it that our eyes see? We call it reality as though it’s fixed, unquestionable. But eyes, like cameras, only see what’s on the surface. The multi-disciplinary artists Richard Caldicott and Luuk de Haan use photographic processes to investigate the abstract languages of our unseen world. Rather than document the representational universe, the one that eyes can see, they use photography to reveal new geometries and the layered, hidden reality beneath the visible aesthetic surface. Along with the work of 14 other artists who use photography to confront the underlying abstract language of our visible world, Caldicott and de Haan’s work is featured in the group show Prime Time: Archetypes of Abstraction in Photography, opening 25 June at Berlin’s DiehlCUBE gallery.
Reality in Crisis
The curatorial statement for the Prime Time exhibition begins with the statement, “Reality is in crisis.” As way of explanation, it then goes on to quote the French astronomer Camille Flammarion, who said, “matter is not, in reality, what it appears to be to our vulgar senses…it is identical with energy, and is only a manifestation of the movement of invisible and imponderable elements.”
In order to explore those “invisible and imponderable elements” of our world, Prime Time’s curator Ralf Hanselle has conceived of an exhibition in four parts. “The Decisive Aeon” highlights work that explores the ways photography examines our perception of time. “Dark Sides” looks back on the origins of photography, to the analog era, when darkness was a fundamental part of the artistic process. “Object_If” and “The Pencil of Nothing” feature works that address the complicated and sometimes fragile relationship between the concepts of image and likeness.
Richard Caldicott - Untitled #170, 2000, C-print, 127 x 102 cm.
Art of Time and Light
Richard Caldicott’s artworks will be included in the section “Object_If.” Caldicott mixes mediums such as drawing with traditional analog photographic techniques and digital printing processes to create abstract, formal, geometric compositions. The visual language of his works is in direct conversation with the forms of his subject matter, though the resulting compositions bring into question the identity and nature of his source imagery.
Along with the work of the other artists featured in Prime Time, Caldicott’s work stretches the boundaries of the photographic medium and examines the unseen, underlying forces that shape and inform the visible world. Rather than utilizing photography as a mimetic tool for copying the representational world, this show endeavors to explore and elucidate reality’s underlying abstract visual language, as revealed through photographic techniques. Prime Time: Archetypes of Abstraction in Photography is on view at DIEHL Gallery and DiehlCUBE in Berlin from 25 June through 23 July 2016. The opening reception is Friday 24 June from 7 – 9pm.
Luuk De Haan - Color Field 2. UltraChrome HD Ink on Hahnemühle paper. 100 x 72.5 cm.
Featured Image: Richard Caldicott
