Fred Cray
Artist Statement
These new works continue the exploration of simultaneity, chance, and visual delight of looking found in the earlier travel diaries and subsequently the compilations. Again film is run through the camera four times. Some exposures are from foreign locations, some in the studio, some in both places. . In the travel diaries small multiple exposed prints in long strips were assembled into panels. In the compilations a primary image was bisected by strips of smaller images, a sort of visual ticker tape. In these works a single multiple exposed frame is blown up and presented on its own.
No subject is off limit and no subject dominates any other. Visual meanings form through layering, flattening and juxtaposing of images.. The problems of thinking and accumulating visual memory to make a coherent singular whole are presented. Often pieces of art by other artists are thrown into the mix. Street scenes, movies, videos, paintings, internet images are all likely subjects. In these recent works different television and computer screens have been photographed provided different textures and dot patterns. Sometimes the images include frames taken off the computer screen as an image is being inverted into a ghost like image and sharpened through a computer program. Always the images are recorded on film and not manipulated in any significant way. The acknowledgement of the digital process is just another element woven into the equation, and the prints are digital archival prints, the first prints from any of these series that are not singular or unique.
An additional layer of text (similar to a movie subtitle) is added after the image is completed. Sometimes, like the use of a visual layer the content has direct comment on the underneath visual activity, sometimes it's almost completely irrelevant, sometimes a coy double entendre. An image of the artist's deceased father is layered with some of the father's favorite film and cartoon imagery. The text reads "so where do we begin" not even necessarily a question leading to different speculations and references. Of course, there's the possiblity of no beginning after the end of life and perhaps the text is the musing an errant omniscient narrator.
These new works continue the exploration of simultaneity, chance, and visual delight of looking found in the earlier travel diaries and subsequently the compilations. Again film is run through the camera four times. Some exposures are from foreign locations, some in the studio, some in both places. . In the travel diaries small multiple exposed prints in long strips were assembled into panels. In the compilations a primary image was bisected by strips of smaller images, a sort of visual ticker tape. In these works a single multiple exposed frame is blown up and presented on its own.
No subject is off limit and no subject dominates any other. Visual meanings form through layering, flattening and juxtaposing of images.. The problems of thinking and accumulating visual memory to make a coherent singular whole are presented. Often pieces of art by other artists are thrown into the mix. Street scenes, movies, videos, paintings, internet images are all likely subjects. In these recent works different television and computer screens have been photographed provided different textures and dot patterns. Sometimes the images include frames taken off the computer screen as an image is being inverted into a ghost like image and sharpened through a computer program. Always the images are recorded on film and not manipulated in any significant way. The acknowledgement of the digital process is just another element woven into the equation, and the prints are digital archival prints, the first prints from any of these series that are not singular or unique.
An additional layer of text (similar to a movie subtitle) is added after the image is completed. Sometimes, like the use of a visual layer the content has direct comment on the underneath visual activity, sometimes it's almost completely irrelevant, sometimes a coy double entendre. An image of the artist's deceased father is layered with some of the father's favorite film and cartoon imagery. The text reads "so where do we begin" not even necessarily a question leading to different speculations and references. Of course, there's the possiblity of no beginning after the end of life and perhaps the text is the musing an errant omniscient narrator.
