About the Exhibition

The Contructed Image featured five contemporary photographers whose work challenged the very nature of truth as documented by the photograph. Through a variety of techniques, including digital and traditional photographic manipulation, set constructions, temporary sculpture, models and intricate dioramas, the artists created a very calculated visual experience. The exhibition included works by artists Luis Gispert, Lori Nix, Daniel Gordon, Chris Scarborough and Nathan Baker.

Many experiences in contemporary life are framed through the lens of the camera. Advertising, television, web pages, film, and publications all employ subtle manipulation to construct a new and often better reality. Blemishes are removed, distractions are dodged and a new context is often placed behind the subject. In The Constructed Image, each artist called into question how truth is recorded and conveyed to the viewer through imagery and the subsequent effect of constructed imagery in contemporary society.

Photographer, filmmaker and sculptor, Luis Gispert, whose work is pictured above, also completed a double solo exhibition titled El Mundo Es Tuyo (The World is Yours) with Zach Feuer Gallery and Mary Boone Gallery in NYC in 2008. Another one of his series features the inside of custom built trucks, which are placed in a new context as the artist digitally combines the ornate interiors of the trucks with luscious and exotic scenes that depict Latin-American socio-economic tableaus. The Whitney Museum in NYC selected work from this series for their permanent collection.

His work was also featured in the 2002 Whitney Biennial and in exhibitions at the Royal Academy of Art, London, Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt, ZKM Center for Art and Media, Karlsruhe, Germany, and MoCA, Shanghai. A survey exhibition of his work will open at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Miami in 2008.

This collection of works in the exhibition presented the viewer with a variety of experiences and questions about the role of truth in contemporary imagery. Each artist confronted the viewer with a hyper-real version of life; one that physically transformed our understanding of what is possible. This work expanded our awareness of the manipulation in photographic sources while also bringing attention to the saturation of constructed imagery in contemporary society.

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