In celebration of New Territory: Landscape Photography Today on view at the Denver Art Museum June 24, 2018 through September 16, 2018, the next two lectures in the Anderman Photography Lecture Series will be given by artists participating in the exhibition: Adam Jeppesen and Sharon Harper.
Adam Jeppesen: Thursday, June 28, 2018, 7-8:30 pm
As part of the events of the exhibition’s opening week, we will host Adam Jeppesen, travelling from out of the country to come speak about his work. Jeppesen was born in Denmark but is based in Buenos Aires, Argentina. His work is inspired by travel, the landscape, solitude and the experience of making and looking at a photograph.
In 2009 Jeppesen began a 487 day solo trek from the North Pole through the Americas to the South Pole in Antarctica. The examples of his work in New Territory were born out of this journey. He took pictures every day and upon his return, as he sifted through the photographs he had made, Jeppesen discovered his work reflected the positive side of solitude as well as the physical and emotional experience of this adventure. Many of the negatives acquired scratches as they jostled around in his hiking pack with dirt and grit throughout his trek. The prints subsequently made from these negatives bore the marks of his journey and he realized the ‘imperfect’ print in fact more accurately reconstructed the nature of his trek than a pristine image of the landscape would be able to. The creative possibility of the imperfections of a photograph inspired several other of his series as well. Much of Jeppesen’s work emphasizes an experience and explores what role photography plays in our perception and memory.
Sharon Harper: Thursday, August 23, 2018 7-8:30 pm
Sharon Harper’s photography and video work explore the relationship between technology and perception through landscape imagery. While her photography explores many facets of the landscape, the celestial landscape, the moon and stars in particular, figure prominently in series such as Sun/Moon (Trying to See through a Telescope), One Month, Weather Permitting, and Moon Studies and Star Scratches.
Throughout these series and others, Harper explores the role photography plays in our relationship with and perception of the landscape. In Sun/Moon (Trying to See through a Telescope) she attaches a camera to a telescope to take pictures of the night sky revealing how the camera can expand our vision as well as alter it. In One Month, Weather Permitting and Moon Studies and Star Scratches, Harper uses extended exposure times and multiple exposures over consecutive days to capture the trail of a star over several minutes or various phases of the moon as seen from one place at multiple points in time all layered into one image. These photographs express the movement of the earth and the abstract concept of time in a singular static image, reminding us the world is much bigger than ourselves.
Image credits: Adam Jeppesen, Incahuasi I, 2016. Xerography and straight pins; 70 ½ x 87 inches. Courtesy the artist and Bendana ǀ Pinel Art Contemporain, Paris. Sharon Harper, Moon Studies and Star Scratches, No. 9 June 4-30, 2005 Clearmont, Wyoming 15, 30, 20, 8, 5, 1, 5, 2, 1 minute exposures; 15, 8, 10, 14 second exposures, 2005. Chromogenic color print. Courtesy of the artist.
