Recent exhibition of photographs by Christopher Phillips

at CYPHER HOUSE 10 -18 October 2009

25-08-2009 07:47:34

Click on image to enlarge

Urban Still Lives

In representing the city I prefer to avoid photographing the iconic modern building. It already receives a disproportionate amount of attention and is all too often read as a one-liner. Bereft of context it usually justifies itself as a magic engine of urban regeneration, simplistically shouting money and power.

More interesting are the ambiguous structures that are the real fabric and character of the city. Buildings as abstract collages of colour and texture with strong geometric forms are what I seek. The challenge is to make visible the ordinary. Photography for me reveals both the unexpected and the formal. Abstraction is achieved without resorting to digital manipulation.

The photographs are arranged to play off each other – they are not just part of a topological series. Each image stands up on its own merit - but the whole, I hope, adds up to more than the sum of its parts.

Front of House - The space between the road and the front door.

This public façade is often thought of as just an extension of the street - home begins the other side of the front door. So, dominating this space we have the utility meter, recycling bins and often quite a lot of rubbish.

I am not interested in glamorising this detritus. What my photographs do is invoke the presence of human activity. They register the weekly drama of an ever changing theatrical space. Discarded failures of consumerism are haphazardly displayed, seas of scaffolding herald change. The optimism of renewal is ever present.

All photographs are in an edition of 30. They are printed with pigmented inks on fibre based archival paper.