Swedish-born, San Francisco-based photographer Gabriel Isak shoots stylized photos filled with enigmatic symbolism and an enchanted ambiance. Solitary figures populate desolate nature scenes that seem to take place in the dead of winter. His color palette of black, grey, brown, and icy, cool blue underscores his work's dark mood. Take a look at some of his recent photos below.
Swedish-born, San Francisco-based photographer Gabriel Isak shoots stylized photos filled with enigmatic symbolism and an enchanted ambiance. Solitary figures populate desolate nature scenes that seem to take place in the dead of winter. His color palette of black, grey, brown, and icy, cool blue underscores his work’s dark mood. Take a look at some of his recent photos below.
Though they're created digitally, Can Pekdemir's portraits mimic the high-contrast values of daguerreotypes. Pekdemir conjures up strange, furry creatures using 3D modeling software, giving them hefty forms and believable textures. The results look as if these characters walked into the artist's studio and posed for the camera. Presented as framed, archival prints, his pieces could pass for photographs. Pekdemir seems to be testing the boundaries between two and three dimensions, virtual and physical. We often take photography to be a truth-telling medium, but Pekdemir exploits this assumption to engage his viewers with these fictional personalities. Take a look at some of his recent work below.
Swedish artist Susanna Hesselberg's latest work plummets deep into the ground Alice-in-Wonderland-style. “When My Father Died It Was Like a Whole Library Had Burned Down” (named after Laurie Anderson’s song "World Without End") is a mind bending reproduction of a library inherited by the artist from her father, created for Denmark's Sculpture by the Sea exhibition series. The biennial festival, which closed on July 5th, boasted 56 site specific installations along the Danish coast. Hesselberg's mysterious contribution is vertical tunnel framed by a piece of glass that allows viewers to peer into a dark tower books only visible by their spines. Hesselberg wanted to recreate the depth of loss or losing control, as one might experience when a loved one dies.
Though he shot it 10 years ago, Phillip Toledano's 2004 photography series "Hope & Fear" still rings true a decade later as a diagnosis of our collective fears in 21st-century America. While the artist's recent work, though highly stylized, is mostly documentary, "Hope & Fear" presents a nightmarish fantasy though its elaborate costuming and staging. In each surreal portrait, the sitter becomes subsumed in a substance or object that represents a specific societal problem or common anxiety taken to the extreme.
Daniel Rueda and Anna Devís, a duo based in Valencia, Spain, travel the world, crafting photographs that use both each other and architecture as characters. Toying with perspective and geometry, each photo the pair publish on their respective Instagram accounts is packed with humor and accompanying text.
