Martin Stupich: Remnants of the First World
On view in the Van Deren Coke Gallery
February 9-July 13, 2013
We build and shape our landscapes and terrains—gardens, bridges, truck stops, quarries, canals and dams—to suit both our physical and emotional desires. Yet this is not without consequences. This exhibition presents a selection of potent images from a larger body of work that Martin Stupich has explored and recorded since the 1970s. These images of some of our most ambitious, often permanent structures are breathtaking to behold yet also pose questions about what it is we are leaving behind as the “remnants” of our culture and time. As the photographer has remarked “These remnants of the first world are the evidence, the trail of clues we leave as we plow ahead….” Stupich clearly works within a historical sphere which harks back to the nineteenth-century and includes some of the great camera artists of that era such as Timothy O’Sullivan, Carleton Watkins and Darius Kinsey.
Martin Stupich NV Hoover Dam Cable Tower Pigment inkjet print Courtesy of the Artist
Martin Stupich Derby Dam on the Truckee Pigment inkjet print Courtesy of the Artist
Martin Stupich Bridge over canal, Venice, California, 1974 Pigment inkjet print Courtesy of the Artist
Main Image: Martin Stupich, Limestone blocks at quarry, Nevada, 1989, Pigment inkjet print
