No Mere Shot in the Dark

Several photographs of O. Winston Link are currently on display at the Reynolda House Museum of American Art in Winston-Salem in an exhibition entitled Trains that Pass in the Night showing from February 19-June 19, 2011. These black-and-white gelatin silver photographs feature images of steam locomotives set against the landscapes of Virginia and North Carolina. While these stunning images reminiscent of the film noir era in which they were taken offer a glimpse into a lifestyle that was at the time ending, they are awe inspiring for the elaborate planning necessary to capture many of the nocturnal images.

The photographs in and of themselves are quite breathtaking. Gorgeous contracts exist between the presence of the trains and the life that seems to continue on around them: people watching a movie at the drive-in, hanging out at the public pool, and even a group of elderly friends chatting on a porch as what must have been a loud steam engine locomotive passes by. But the clarity of the images of these trains in motion set against these seemingly colloquial interactions forces an appreciation for the choreographed facade, for many of these images were staged with but one opportunity as the train passed to be captured.

One photograph contains the photographer himself, his assistant, and their equipment. Looking at the various lamps and flash equipment then studying the crisp images of billowing plumes of steam as they are exhaled from the sleek locomotives as they travel by it is a marvel how brilliantly effective they worked. The lighting and timing are everything in Link’s work. Every detail was minutely attended to from the placement of the people, the direction of the lighting, to the schedule of the trains in order to capture a moment in time designed to depict an entire way of life. Link didn’t miss an opportunity, but he also made sure to create the optimum setting for what otherwise would have passed into the night and out of time unnoticed.

-Veronica Monique Ibarra

http://www.reynoldahouse.org/discover/exhibitions/c_exhibitions_detail.php?feature-id=911613380

Fading as Memory Does

At the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art (SECCA) in Winston-Salem currently on display from March 12 – June 5, 2011 is Imprints for a Fleeting Memorial by Oscar Muñoz. The exhibit consists of many portraits representing people who disappear, and as the subjects, the images likewise are destined to fade before your eyes leaving only the memory of what once was. The images evaporate, drain away, deteriorate and crumble. A few are indistinct images burned into paper, but even those are not meant to last as the series progresses with the loss of the original subject.

The first display to catch my eye is a group of nine soft, warm faces each within their own square, placed close together to be essentially a piece of a larger square of unified work. The faces are each oriented as if focusing in different directions with varying expressions like they were caught in the middle of a conversation.

Walking slowly towards the display the faces become more obviously pixelated, made up of cubes of white and shades of brown. It isn’t until I come very close that the cubes reveal themselves to be crystalline granular constructions - sugar cubes. The array of browns is due to varying degrees of coffee saturation. Suddenly, I notice the crumbling of a few of the cubes, and the images that were at first soft and warm take on a bittersweetness as their deterioration becomes inevitable.

Each piece in the collection provokes contemplation of the fleeting lives we lead, and the fading of our own memories. Marcus Aurelius once wrote, “Time is a sort of river of passing events, and strong is its current; no sooner is a thing brought to sight than it is swept by and another takes its place, and this too will be swept away.” Oscar Muñoz’s work is an excellent, if sad, embodiment of this sentiment.

Another piece that illustrates this is a series of newsprint images blown-up and burned into six separate newspapers. As I begin to flip through the pages the images that were burned into the cover page utilizing a dot matrix become less and less evident until the last page is blank, but for a few dots devoid of any meaningful context.

The medium is as fleeting as the images created, yet somehow the poignant message seems branded upon my memory. Time will tell how well this stays with me.

-Veronica Monique Ibarra

http://www.secca.org/exhibitions/2011/Oscar.htm