Braun boutique gave away the art opening across the
block. Tonight's opening is for a show of photography
by Alison Nickles. Alison, a native of North Carolina,
graduated from Savannah (Georgia) College of Art and
Design with a BFA in photography and currently resides
in Bushwick, New York. Her work can be seen at
www.alisonphotography.com or at Apollo Braun Boutique
through August 28th.
The mock biography on Alison's web site says: "I called
Nan [Goldin]. She told me prostitution is for whores;
photography is the same but your body is the camera
and your john is your subject. Now I know what I want
is honest photography that tells a story."
As one walks through the crowd into the gallery, the
portraits of young people on the walls look exactly
like the people smoking outside the opening. They look
like the kids who wonder through Manhattan's Lower East Side,
or live in Bushwick, and yet, Alison says that these are
her friends from Georgia. They look like some of our
friends in their early twenties all across United
States.
Turntables and guitars, cigarettes and tattoos,
violence and junk food, piles of empty beer bottles
and plastic coffee cups permeate the atmosphere of
clean and noble medium format C prints. But this
evidence does not give away the presence of renegade
youth nearly as much as does the gaze of the
protagonists. The look in the slightly widened eyes of
youngsters across all of the prints is at once anxious
and subdued, wasted and worried, violent and
frightened, cool and tortured, empty and full of
mystery yet extremely matter-of-fact and extremely
striking to the audience. There is universally
recognizable beauty and sadness in this portrait of
artistic struggling twenty-somethings, fighting, partying and
playing music to be themselves. "Isn't it great how
her crutch is totally unexposed, but her hairy legs
are," says Alison to a friend, pointing to a photo of
a dumbfounded couple with guitars between their legs.
Alison shared that professionally staged looking
portraits were shot at house parties with friends
gathered on the occasion of helping create her art
project; "Bribing a bunch of broke hipsters with
beer." When asked what the series is about, she said
"These are my dreams." Yet the characters in her
dreams are her friends sincerely playing their own
parts. That is why there is a beautiful discrepancy
between staged organization of these shots and their
deeply sincere expressions. These people are truly
living in the moment, for better or for worse, and the
authenticity of this moment carries through in the photographs.
This production is an example of how real life can turn
into an art project about itself.
All writings here are copyrighted by Antonio Goicochea and Galya Kovalyova. You may not use them without written permission but you may link to the posts or give out a link to the posts.
All Photographs here are copyrighted by Galya Kovalyova. You may not use them without written permission but you may link to the posts or give out a link to the posts.
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