Joel Lardner, Dan Tobin Smith
2 - 12 December 2010
2 - 12 December 2010
The Viewfinder Photography Gallery is pleased to present “The Krystal
World,” a collaborative project initiated by Joel Lardner and Dan Tobin
Smith. The project attempts to stimulate new imaginative strategies via
an alchemical photomontage technique. Smith’s photographic archive
provides a seductive sequence of images from which new meanings are
formed and new worlds explored. Cordyceps fungi provides a way of
understanding this creative process and the discourse associated with
beauty and decay that permeates this body of work.
© Dan Tobin Smith
© Joel Lardner
© Joel Lardner
© Joel Lardner
Cordyceps is a
type of parasitic fungi found mainly on insects and other arthropods, a
few are parasitic on other fungi. When a Cordyceps fungus attacks a
host, the mycelium invades and eventually replaces the host tissue,
while the elongated fruiting body may be cylindrical, branched, or of
complex shape. These organic, unusual and beautiful shapes are created
by the parasitic fungi invading the host body. There is a parallel here
with the visual outcomes of this collaborative project.
The photographs of Dan Tobin Smith are transformed and transmuted into different forms by the illustrative work of Joel Lardner in an expressive, organic and intuitive response to the original photographic work. These organic forms evolve out of the photographic work and depend upon it for their development in much the same way as the Cordyceps fungus invades and exploits its host for its own development and survival.
Venue: Viewfinder Photography Gallery, London
Price: Free
