Image above: © John Arsenault, "12:28 pm," Los Angeles, 2013, Archival pigment print, Courtesy of ClampArt, New York City.
ClampArt presented last week “For You!,” an exhibition of photographs by John Arsenault—the artist’s fourth solo show at the gallery. Best known for his arresting self-portraits, Arsenault’s new series of photographs of roses highlights the artist’s fascination with quotidian beauty and the unexpected way in which the familiar can be celebrated through the use of readily available technology. “For You!” reveals a tender, romantic side of Arsenault—an image-maker steeped in the history of art. In an aesthetic tradition echoing Georgia O’Keeffe, Arsenault’s tightly-focused photographs of flowers are a 21st-century update on a subject that has fascinated artists back to the 17th-century Dutch flower painters. Composing the photographs with his iPhone and uploading them to Instagram, Arsenault is able to receive immediate feedback on new images from his followers. The ubiquitous nature of cell phone cameras and Instagram’s growth as a kind of casual “sketchbook” for many young artists is reflected in this project, which was often made during Arsenault’s daily routine. The innovations in digital file sharing then allow the photographer to send his images from his studio in Los Angeles to his printer in New York City instantaneously. The speed with which this allows him to work, in addition to the crowdsourced critique, have ultimately resulted in more images from which to create a tighter final edit, and a more streamlined process than his traditional working method with analog film.
© John Arsenault, "1:22 pm," Los Angeles, 2014, Archival pigment print, Courtesy of ClampArt, New York City.
© John Arsenault, "11:39 am," Los Angeles, 2013, Archival pigment print, Courtesy of ClampArt, New York City.
© John Arsenault, "11:28 am," Los Angeles, 2014, Archival pigment print, Courtesy of ClampArt, New York City.
© John Arsenault, "2:49 pm," Los Angeles, 2012, Archival pigment print, Courtesy of ClampArt, New York City.
November 20 – December 20, 2014
