Kathy Lovas revisits an earlier stage of her career to create a tribute to Anna Atkins, a pioneering 19th-century photographer and botanist. After earning a degree in biology, Lovas pursued biological research on San Juan Island in Washington state, collecting samples of algae that she saved by pressing into absorbent rag paper. Now, in homage to Atkins’ use in 1843 of cyanotypes (an early photographic process) to depict algae, Lovas has transferred her own samples to new prints, under the title "Holdfast."
This month, in the latest installment of the thought-provoking, conceptually sophisticated program at Liliana Bloch Gallery, three artists use photography to explore the relationship between past and present, in all its complexity and nuance.
Selections from Misty Keasler’s series, "On Belonging," highlight the vastness of nature, as encountered by children individually or in small groups. Much as in 19th-century Romantic painting, the encounter between the small, thoughtful figures and the boundless natural world suggests a hidden emotional significance
"Wash My Hands Clean," by Fort Worth-based Fernando Alvarez, enacts a delayed response to his personal experiences, as a teenager in his native Honduras, of political crime and trauma. In each photograph in the series, a hand grips a bar of soap inscribed with a name and age, referencing the political connotation of "clean hands," and the mode of task-based performance art developed by Yvonne Rainer and the Judson Dance Theater in the 1960s.
Details
“Kathy Lovas: Holdfast, after Anna Atkins,” “Misty Keasler: Selected works from the series On Belonging” and “Fernando Alvarez: Wash My Hands Clean” continue through Oct. 30 at Liliana Bloch Gallery, 4741 Memphis St., Dallas. Free. Open Thursday through Saturday from noon to 5 p.m. and by appointment.
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