Todd Hido #6415 copyright 2007
Todd Hido has a group of new photographs at Bruce Silverstein. The work, beautiful, mysterious and eerie, is an interesting look at the American landscape and the way in which most of us are engaged with it…. from the seat of our car. In addition to the press release I find the work to be interesting in the way it deals with perception and the idea of seeing through something (in this case a windshield) that might alter, expand or limit one’s reaction to or understanding of the environment they are in. It references the camera and an experience that may be mediated by the lens, where one’s perception (and understanding) can be blurred in one aspect and clear in another. When looking at Hido’s landscapes and thinking of the relationship between photography and painting I recalled THIS painting, among others, by Gerhard Richter as well as the current Carla Klein show at Tanya Bonakdar. The Todd Hido and Carla Klein shows are definitely worth the visit!
From the Press Release:
Presented mostly in large scale, these photographs hit a new mark. Looking from the vantage point of his car seat, and shooting outward through ever changing layered mixtures of condensation, grit, and reflecting glare upon the car’s windshield, Hido masterfully transforms the mundane terrain peripherally sandwiching the myriad of roads typically dotting the outskirts of American cities, into inexplicable poignant images, filled with cinematic gravitas and dream-like sublimity, often “crossing the double lines’ between painting and photography.
While Hido embraces the aesthetic, it is not without a critical eye. He is drawn to austere scenes that characterize America as an empty place, evidenced by crossroads, dead-end streets, broken trees, and seemingly endless highways. Moody and psychological, like the times we live in, these landscapes are metaphors for personal emotions, evocative of the dark things that keep us up at night.
