I am delighted to be taking part in Photo London at Somerset House for the first time.
In conjunction with Joanna Bryant, we will show a solo presentation of new works by Nikolai Ishchuk at Stand D10 in the Discovery section, curated, once again, by Tristan Lund.
We will be presenting new works from Nikolai’s new series, Thresholds, alongside earlier Photosculptures.
You will be able to see further images of the works and the booth HERE.
Thresholds Series- (2017-18)
Silver Gelatin prints on expired fiber paper, acrylic, ink, mounting tape, polyurethane, aluminium.
All Unique.
Nikolai Ishchuk’s practice explores the realm of the ‘photographic’ in the widest sense – specifically its essential elements of light, space, and objecthood – and encompasses mixed-media 2D work, sculpture, line drawings, installation, and image. The London-based artist uses photographic materials, methods and thinking to produce not representations, but objects in their own right.
New series Thresholds plays with basic photographic binaries: the difference between exposure and no exposure at all. “Thresholds continues my enquiry into the conditions of something being ‘photographic’ and how attempts to distill these explode the boundaries of photography and put it in relation to other media. It moves away from the color and heavy layering of my previous 2D work, and seeks to develop a purer approach to photographic paper as material. I’m using its basic inherent quality of light registration to create large areas of solid exposure spanning multiple sheets, and in doing so I negotiate various thresholds that define my practice – of image and imagelessness; fragment and whole; pictorial plane and support. The arcs of the shapes do not create perfect circles or ellipses, but they need to read like they just might. They could be close ups of architectural material or sections of mathematical graphs, or depictions of something cosmic.”
“These geometric forms are made in the darkroom with no camera or negative, there is a purity to them that is incredibly tactile and seductive.” Tristan Lund, May 2018