dayoutlast: Benjamin Carlson @ Park View

dayoutlast is a record of my direct engagement with mostly contemporary art, mostly Los Angelean.

As this blog has evolved since its 2010 inception, so has my perspective. What I once perceived as central within the investigation was what was central, literally, within the photographic frame that I shared here. While still an important consideration, such thinking has also given way to more peripheral considerations, ones also accompanied occasionally by text (written manifestation of thought) and the oscillations between them. What's missing here are larger unknowns surrounding issues of presentation and representation; the amount of time and space it actually takes to accomplish such first-hand observations; and the quandaries between documentation and interpretation.

Despite my attempt to communicate here with image and text what is essential in some respect about the artwork, neither representation should ever be considered a substitution for the primary viewing experience. Of course, occasionally there are exceptions.

Most of the time, these posts are merely remnants---residual fragments---from my last day out.

--Justin Lowman

Saturday, July 16, 2016

Benjamin Carlson @ Park View

Pictures within pictures. Apple as icon and painted fruit; conflation of (corporate) symbol and (religious/artistic) symbol. Painted v. Printed (wood grain). Surface views that suggest above/below, in/out...

A complicated (layered) view of nature posed through still life. A painting as a window onto a counter (natural wood grain) against a wood panelled wall through another window into a dark wooded forest barely lit. Bright vibrant interior (the space between the picture plane and the rear window; surrounded by dim lifeless color. iPad pictures bright green color. Flat on a counter, the main signified of pictorial depth.