Jeff Wall exhibit at SFMOMA

I had the pleasure of going to the donor preview of this exhibit on Wednesday night, and wow was I blown away. It's an incredible exhibit, well put together and wonderfully shown. Jeff Wall's work is different, and it's clear through his images what his intention and goal is.

I think the most interesting thing about these photos is how they are shown. They are huge: taking up practically entire walls. Also, they are shown by being mounted and lit from the back, like ads at bus stops or in the subway. Wall justifies these two choices of exhibition with two reasons. For the first, he believes in the preservation of traditional art, and so he exhibits his photos in large format as if they were enormous canvases; traditional art style. For the backlit, bus stop ad style, he is exploring the use of cinematography.

Jeff Wall also carefully poses his photos. While we seem to be catching glimpses of spontaneous moments, look carefully: everything is so sharp and clear and clean you can see the slight cinema aspect to it.

One thing I noticed through his photos is that, while his pictures depict enormous scenes, the title is usually a very small part of the photo. Example: one photo is called "Story Teller" and after a long examination, you see the story teller. She is in the bottom left hand corner, very small. I like his inclusion of everything and yet focus on one thing.

Go see this show. It's fabulous, interesting, and extremely nice to look at.

Runs till january 27th 2008
More info click here

I would have to say my personal favorite photos were:

-"The Flooded Grave": Life and death. Life growing in death. Go see it (google it if you are unable).

-"A ventriloquist at a birthday party in October 1947": So. Very. Creepy. And yet...we can't look away.