Tuesday 8 November 2011

REAR WINDOW - VISUAL RESEARCH 3


from ‘Dirty Windows’ by Merry Alpern

Shot covertly in 1994 across an air shaft, through a bathroom window on Wall Street, Alpern's photographs of female prostitutes and high-powered businessmen are strange and indistinct. Captured yet elusive, these images are more startling in their voyeuristic magnetism than they are shocking. The viewer must try to make sense of them, to cull stories from blurred lines and sheds of fabric.

Alpern herself said:

Reoccurring characters gave these pantomimes a soap opera quality and I'd try to decipher plot lines and guess the next scene. These minidramas and their unvarying props-- condoms, tatoos, silicone, crack-- filled my head and I began to think about the windows all the time. They found their way into my dreams.

She also did a series called ‘Shopping’ in 1999.

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