Carina Brandes is a German artist who deals in the ethereal — the photographer’s exhibition, Blow Up, at New York’s team (gallery, inc.) weaving a weird and wonderful, semi-lucid narrative though powerful black-and-white imagery.
There are echoes of Ryan McGinley’s carefree nudes dancing through dreamy landscapes, Brandes’s visual ambiguity a darker reverie, though. I don’t know what Bugs Bunny is doing, but he looks like he’s having a ball. Carina Brandes, meanwhile, is both subject and artist, creeping through her own works; protagonist and storyteller.
The German goes back-to-basics with her photography, hand-producing the prints; choosing unusual frames; controlling their presentation — effectively putting the artistry back into art photography. Classical art is referenced, too, the Greek mythology of Atlas and Sisyphus via an esoteric orb; the birth of Venus via nudes on a beach. Symbolism, partial narrative, Delphic interpretations of the real world … Carina Brandes’s art is infectious in its twilight complexity.
Blow Up by Carina Brandes continues at team (gallery, inc.)’s Wooster St location until 3 April.
Untitled, 2016
Black and white photograph on baryta paper
55 x 41 in., 136 x 102 cm
Untitled, 2016
Black and white photograph on baryta paper
25 x 33.5 in., 85 x 103.5 cm
Untitled, 2016
Black and white photograph on baryta paper
25 x 25.5 in., 33.5 x 49 cm
Installation images courtesy, the artist and Team Gallery
