Cancellations

Description

Thomas Barrow's Cancellations is a series of photographic prints of desolate spaces - empty lots, construction sites, deserted industrial sites - that all show the presence of mankind without revealing the presence of a single human being. Compiled in the 70s and 80s, these stunning sepia-toned images show their age in their sheer physicality. At once a mordant social commentary on the built environment and a link to the process art movement, this work specifically calls attention to the power of the photographic negative and print as a tangible object.

Thomas Barrow studied at the Kansas City Art Institute and the IIT Institute of Design in Chicago under Aaron Siskind. After graduation Barrow began his career at the George Eastman House, becoming Assistant Director and Editor of Publications before moving to New Mexico in 1973. At the University of New Mexico he was Associate Director of the University Art Museum and taught studio photography and history of photography. His photographic work has been exhibited widely and is in the permanent collections of the George Eastman House, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, National Gallery of Art, National Gallery of Canada, the Center for Creative Photography-where his archive is housed-and numerous other public and private collections. Geoffrey Batchen is Professor of Art History at Victoria University of Wellington in New Zealand. His books include Burning With Desire (The MIT Press, 1977); Each Wild Idea (The MIT Press, 2001); Forget Me Not (Van Gogh Museum/Princeton Architectural Press, 2004); William Henry Fox Talbot (Phaidon, 2008); Photography Degree Zero (The MIT Press, 2009); Suspending Time: Life-Photography-Death (Izu Photo Museum, 2010); and Picturing Atrocity: Photography in Crisis (Reaktion, 2012).

"Cancellations reminds me of The Velvet Underground and Nico not many people actually heard it (saw it) when it was new, but those that did found themselves inspired to push their art in unexpected directions. Joel-Peter Witkin, Chris McCaw -- really anyone who's cut, burned, boiled or scraped a negative -- owes Barrow a debt for opening the door ahead of them. If you're at all interested in photography that challenges the f64-style image, Cancellations will leave you satisfied." --David Ondrik, photo-eye "Barrow's 'Cancellations' were photographic koans, exquisitely concise meditations on the conditions and conventions of photography." -Artforum