PERSPECTIVE FLOOD
Taiyo Watanabe + Dan Schwalm, 2018
Digital Prints
65" x 44" & 96" x 44"
"While some explanations hold that photographs undermined Western spatial representation from within, like termites, other feature Japanese woodblock prints invading from outside the system, like killer bees. Artists like Gaugin, in search of an art based more on imagination than on copying nature's appearances, ostensibly found the "irrational," non-Western look of the prints' preternaturally enlarged foregrounds and unmolded flat forms to be absolutely in tune with what they were after. Thus, from the painting of Manet in the 1860s onward, in the work of Degas and Gauguin and countless other painters of the day, the crucial innovations in pictorial space have again and again been attributed interchangeably either to the influence of photography, or to that of Japanese prints, or to both together, with the same result in view: the breakdown of the Western perspectival tradition. So goes the oft-told story: the link-up of the termites and the killer bees helped destroy Renaissance perspective and set Western art out on the Road to Flatness. This idea of change wrought by new machines or foreign influences is essentially a variant on an old Romantic notion which claims that real creation depends on getting outside all of our familiar cultural conventions."
- Kirk Varnedoe, A Fine Disregard: What Makes Art Modern
Taiyo Watanabe an architect/photographer from Los Angeles and Dan Schwalm a photographer from Omaha exhibited a series of work representing an individual's perspective of "FLOOD", an ongoing exhibit located within downtown Omaha's Standard Oil Building by Mike Nesbit.
Through their perspective, the viewer is placed into a precarious position of trying to understand what is the Art? Is it the somber concrete panels that float in a forgotten space, hinting at the sublime, or is it the space itself? At moments their images paint a scene where objects and space are interdependent of one another. Or, ironically is the Art their own image, poetically captured and curated within the Maple St. Construct space. Perspective FLOOD brings to mind representation of representation at multiple scales. From captured stills of artwork, to the construction of a contemporary museum (the Standard Oil Building) as a means to represent photographs within the gallery, it conjures critical characteristics of what makes Art relevant and provocative today in terms of scale, cultural conventions, technique and representation.
Show Sponsor: Lucky Bucket Brewing Co.
Taiyo Watanabe + Dan Schwalm, 2018
Digital Prints
65" x 44" & 96" x 44"
"While some explanations hold that photographs undermined Western spatial representation from within, like termites, other feature Japanese woodblock prints invading from outside the system, like killer bees. Artists like Gaugin, in search of an art based more on imagination than on copying nature's appearances, ostensibly found the "irrational," non-Western look of the prints' preternaturally enlarged foregrounds and unmolded flat forms to be absolutely in tune with what they were after. Thus, from the painting of Manet in the 1860s onward, in the work of Degas and Gauguin and countless other painters of the day, the crucial innovations in pictorial space have again and again been attributed interchangeably either to the influence of photography, or to that of Japanese prints, or to both together, with the same result in view: the breakdown of the Western perspectival tradition. So goes the oft-told story: the link-up of the termites and the killer bees helped destroy Renaissance perspective and set Western art out on the Road to Flatness. This idea of change wrought by new machines or foreign influences is essentially a variant on an old Romantic notion which claims that real creation depends on getting outside all of our familiar cultural conventions."
- Kirk Varnedoe, A Fine Disregard: What Makes Art Modern
Taiyo Watanabe an architect/photographer from Los Angeles and Dan Schwalm a photographer from Omaha exhibited a series of work representing an individual's perspective of "FLOOD", an ongoing exhibit located within downtown Omaha's Standard Oil Building by Mike Nesbit.
Through their perspective, the viewer is placed into a precarious position of trying to understand what is the Art? Is it the somber concrete panels that float in a forgotten space, hinting at the sublime, or is it the space itself? At moments their images paint a scene where objects and space are interdependent of one another. Or, ironically is the Art their own image, poetically captured and curated within the Maple St. Construct space. Perspective FLOOD brings to mind representation of representation at multiple scales. From captured stills of artwork, to the construction of a contemporary museum (the Standard Oil Building) as a means to represent photographs within the gallery, it conjures critical characteristics of what makes Art relevant and provocative today in terms of scale, cultural conventions, technique and representation.
Show Sponsor: Lucky Bucket Brewing Co.
Photos Courtesy of Taiyo Watanabe
About the Artists:
Taiyo Watanabe is a professional architectural designer and an accomplished architectural photographer. He received a Bachelor of Architecture from the Southern California Institute of Architecture in Los Angeles. With a background in architecture coupled with a keen interest in photography this has resulted in masterful and technically precise architectural captures. Watanabe's photographs have been included in publications such as Architect Magazine, Architectural Record, CLOG, HYPEBEAST, Log, Taschen books and others.
www.taiyowatanabe.com
Dan Schwalm is an architectural photographer for HDR’s global architecture company based out of Omaha, Nebraska. He creates visually compelling images for projects ranging in size from 1,000 square feet to millions of square feet for both domestic and international HDR architects, interior designers and other professionals to help tell their project stories, all while adhering to a corporate budget. Schwalm’s work is featured in many publications, and he has helped HDR win an ever-increasing amount of design awards.
www.danschwalmphoto.com
Taiyo Watanabe is a professional architectural designer and an accomplished architectural photographer. He received a Bachelor of Architecture from the Southern California Institute of Architecture in Los Angeles. With a background in architecture coupled with a keen interest in photography this has resulted in masterful and technically precise architectural captures. Watanabe's photographs have been included in publications such as Architect Magazine, Architectural Record, CLOG, HYPEBEAST, Log, Taschen books and others.
www.taiyowatanabe.com
Dan Schwalm is an architectural photographer for HDR’s global architecture company based out of Omaha, Nebraska. He creates visually compelling images for projects ranging in size from 1,000 square feet to millions of square feet for both domestic and international HDR architects, interior designers and other professionals to help tell their project stories, all while adhering to a corporate budget. Schwalm’s work is featured in many publications, and he has helped HDR win an ever-increasing amount of design awards.
www.danschwalmphoto.com