Antwaun Sargent curates genre-defying photography exhibition in St. Louis
At projects+gallery, St. Louis, critic, curator and author Antwaun Sargent has conceived an exhibition of young photographers who are turning their gazes to a new, genreless mode of photography
In St. Louis, Missouri, a new exhibition is rethinking the definition of contemporary photography. ‘Just Pictures’ surveys a new age of genre-bending photographers whose work oscillates between contexts and disciplines of fine art, fashion photography, and the history of the medium.
The exhibition is conceived and curated by critic and author Antwaun Sargent, and held at projects+gallery. Sargent is perhaps best known for his highly-lauded book, The New Black Vanguard, a critical, and strikingly visual anthology exploring how a new generation of young Black photographers are eradicating the parameters of art and fashion.
Along similar lines, ‘Just Pictures’ seeks to disrupt the conventional constraints of photography, in favour of a non-prescriptive approach where formal definitions are defunct and approaches are fluid. The resulting images could feel equally at home on the pages of glossy magazines, social media feeds, on museum walls or in domestic spaces. ‘Central to these images is the collaborative complicity of the image maker and their subjects but also the seemingly disparate histories of photography, from landscape and vernacular to portraiture and fashion,’ Sargent explains.
The featured artists are Ruth Ossai, Arielle Bobb-Willis, Yagazie Emezi, Mous Lamrabat, Renell Medrano, Rafael Pavarotti, Joshua Kissi, Justin Solomon and Joshua Woods. Ruth Ossai uses fashion as a tool to transport narratives that explore and celebrate her personal history and the broader cultural identity of her subjects. Renell Medrano casts new light on street and documentary photography, with images imbued with glamour and rich symbolism.
New York-based Medrano – whose recent photographic subjects have included the likes of Jay-Z and Solange – has a practice firmly rooted in her parents’ birthplace of the Dominican Republic, which she infused into her work documenting the streets of her childhood borough, the Bronx. Meanwhile, the surreal and luminous work of Arielle Bobb-Willis takes cues from the dynamic abstractions of 20th-century modernist painters including Jacob Lawrence and Milton Avery.
‘The way these images move rapidly between contexts, garnering new and often contradictory meanings, that allow them to simultaneously operate as racial representations while also being discrete product shots, documentations of family and glossies of the latest fashion trends,’ says Sargent. ‘For this generation of emerging imagemakers, the photographer's eye is illimitable: a picture is just a picture’
INFORMATION
‘Just Pictures’, until November 21, 2020, projects+gallery. projects-gallery.com
Wallpaper* Newsletter
Receive our daily digest of inspiration, escapism and design stories from around the world direct to your inbox.
Harriet Lloyd-Smith was the Arts Editor of Wallpaper*, responsible for the art pages across digital and print, including profiles, exhibition reviews, and contemporary art collaborations. She started at Wallpaper* in 2017 and has written for leading contemporary art publications, auction houses and arts charities, and lectured on review writing and art journalism. When she’s not writing about art, she’s making her own.
-
Three new coffee makers for a contemporary brew, from a casual cup to a full-on branded espresso
Three new coffee makers, from AeroPress, Jura and Porsche x La Marzocco, range from the defiantly manual to the bells and whistles of a traditional countertop espresso machine
By Jonathan Bell Published
-
Don't miss Luxembourg's retro-futuristic lab pavilion in Venice
As the Venice Biennale enters its last few weeks, catch 'A Comparative Dialogue Act' at the Luxembourg Pavilion
By Amah-Rose Abrams Published
-
A Berlin park atop an office building offers a new model of urban landscaping
A Berlin park and office space by Grüntuch Ernst Architeken offer a symbiotic relationship between urban design and green living materials
By Michael Webb Published
-
New York photography show sees cultural icons – from David Hockney to Maya Angelou – in unguarded moments
‘Face to Face’ at New York’s International Center of Photography (27 January – 1 May 2023) sees cultural icons shot by Tacita Dean, Brigitte Lacombe and Catherine Opie
By Martha Elliott Published
-
Inez & Vinoodh on 35 years of radical photography, being ‘two brains, one person', and judging our Design Awards
Dutch photography duo and Wallpaper* Design Awards 2023 judges Inez & Vinoodh discuss image manipulation, design aspirations, and capturing the legendary Julianne Moore
By Harriet Lloyd-Smith Published
-
A poignant exploration of the lives of transgender and gender non-conforming older people
To celebrate Pride Month 2022, we revisit photographer Jess T Dugan’s series of intimate portraits of transgender adults over 50, first explored by Wallpaper* in this 2020 article on the occasion of an exhibition at Minneapolis Institute of Art
By Pei-Ru Keh Last updated
-
Chris Levine on creating his iconic portrait of Queen Elizabeth II: ‘I was the wild card’
For the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee celebrations, we spoke to artist Chris Levine about the making of his iconic hologram portraits of Her Majesty. He reflects on two years of preparation, that fateful day in Buckingham Palace, and Lightness of Being, the outtake that almost outshone the original
By Harriet Lloyd Smith Last updated
-
Serge Attukwei Clottey on fashion, gender, and unexpected art
In captivating new portraits for ‘Beyond Skin’, Ghanaian artist Serge Attukwei Clottey explores fashion as identity and subverts antiquated ideas of gender and sexuality
By Pei-Ru Keh Last updated
-
Aya Brown’s portraits are love letters to Black female essential workers
Artist Aya Brown’s portrait series featuring Black female essential workers is currently on display across nine bus stops in Brooklyn, in collaboration with Virgil Abloh’s Public Domain project
By Fiona Mahon Last updated
-
Masked artist series raises money for art therapy
Grayson Perry, Jenny Saville and Camille Walala are photographed for a new portrait series by Joanna Vestey, in support of art therapy charity AT The Bus
By Joanna Vestey - Photography Last updated
-
‘I see portraiture as a means to impart a social commentary’
Self-taught Nigerian painter Eniwaye Oluwaseyi addresses #EndSARS in his debut show at ADA gallery in Accra
By Pei-Ru Keh Last updated