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Orientation: Horizontal
Cortina d'Ampezzo - sunset color mountain photography, limited edition of 5.
Located in London, GB
'Cortina d'Ampezzo' 2022 It is a colour film photograph of Cortina d'Ampezzo, Dolomite mountain area in Italy, made using a 4x5 Large format camera Linhof. Ugne Pouwell does all the...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Landscape Photography

Materials

Film, Photographic Film, Photographic Paper, Giclée

Haapasaari, Finland (Rock in body of water + celestial horizon)
Located in Sante Fe, NM
Pentti Sammallahti is a benchmark figure in contemporary Finnish photography. His works depict nature eroded and broken down by civilization, but h...
Category

20th Century Contemporary Black and White Photography

Materials

Silver Gelatin

Reed Crescendo, Eagle Nest Lake, New Mexico
Located in Sante Fe, NM
24 x 50" 8-ply mat for an additional $185.00 - Born in 1939 in Louisville Kentucky, David Gibson is primarily a self-taught photographer. Years of developing and refining his photo...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Black and White Photography

Materials

Silver Gelatin

XX Centuries - Contemporary, Photograph, Landscape, 21st Century, Color, Night
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
XX Centuries (2011)
 55 x 66 cm, Edition of 2/5. Photography printed in Canson Baryta Prestige 340gr (not mounted) Signed on back with Certificate. About myself I was born and rai...
Category

2010s Contemporary Landscape Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Color, Archival Pigment

Andres: Monument Valley, Arizona 1968.
Located in Cologne, DE
Andres was born 1905 in Germany and passed away 1992. He started his career as a photographer in 1920. He was one of the first photographers, who used a Leica. His images today are d...
Category

1960s Modern Black and White Photography

Materials

Black and White

Radiant Mountain Aspen, Colorado
Located in Carmel, CA
Mint Condition Hand printed by artist. Signed and numbered by artist. Cibachrome paper. Framed in off white metal.
Category

1990s Color Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper

Thunderstorm II, Platinum, animal, elephant, black and white photography
Located in München, BY
Joachim Schmeisser "Thunderstorm II" Kenya 2019 Unique Piece 6 Handmade Platinum Palladium Prints Signed, titled and numbered Sheet size 112 x 76 c...
Category

2010s Contemporary Black and White Photography

Materials

Platinum

Chalk Streams 9, 2023 - Limited Edition Digital C-Type Print on Fuji Maxima Matt
Located in Brighton, GB
Chalk Streams 9 is a stunning C-Type Print on Fuji Maxima Matte Paper. This size print is available in a Limited Edition of 7 + 2 Artist Proofs. In her new series, Chalk Streams, El...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Landscape Photography

Materials

Color, Photographic Paper, C Print

Mountain View - Vintage Photograph - 1930s
Located in Roma, IT
Mountain view is a color vintage photo, realized in 1930s. Good conditions and aged. It belongs to a historical and nostalgic album includin...
Category

1930s Contemporary Figurative Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper

Tulle no. 8, Point Reyes National Seashore, California
Located in Sante Fe, NM
“The hovering installations featured in this ongoing series of photographs are inspired by self-organizing, "emergent" systems in nature such as termite mounds, swarming locusts, sch...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Color Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Zzyzx Resort Pool, Soda Dry Lake, California - American Landscape Color Photo
Located in Cambridge, GB
Part of Richard Heeps 'Dream in Colour' Series, he was set a challenge to find something interesting on the road from LA to Las Vegas. In the heart of the Mojave Desert, Richard foun...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Color Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Silver Gelatin

Roy's Motel - Route 66, Amboy, California - American Landscape Color Photography
Located in Cambridge, GB
Part of Richard Heeps 'Dream in Colour' Series, this is one of his classic American signs featuring the historic site Mid-Century Modern Googie architecture of Roy's Motel on the Nat...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Color Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Silver Gelatin

Tulle no. 23, Point Reyes National Seashore, CA
Located in Sante Fe, NM
The hovering installations featured in this ongoing series of photographs are inspired by self-organizing, "emergent" systems in nature such as termite mounds, swarming locusts, scho...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Color Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Morning. Noon. Night. - Contemporary, Polaroid, Nude, Color
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
'Morning. Noon. Night' part of the series 'A girl called N.' 2019, 19x25cm, Edition 1/7 plus 2 Artist Proofs, digital C-Print based on a Polaroid, not mounted. Signed on the back and...
Category

2010s Contemporary Landscape Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

David Burdeny - Iceberg Remains, Antarctica, Photography 2020, Printed After
Located in Greenwich, CT
David Burdeny (b. 1968. Winnipeg, Canada) graduated with a Masters in Architecture and Interior Design and spent the early part of his career practicing in his field before establish...
Category

2010s Contemporary Landscape Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper, C Print, Digital

Slim Aarons Estate Edition - Skiers in Lech
Located in London, GB
Slim Aarons Estate Stamped Edition Limited to 150 only Skiers line up for a hike to ski resort Zurs from Lech, Austria, February 1979. (Photo by Slim Aarons) This photograph epitomises the travel style and glamour of the period's wealthy and famous, beautifully documented by Aarons. In his words, he loved to photograph 'attractive people in attractive places, doing attractive things'. A beautiful and classic Slim Aarons C Type photograph (unframed). Limited edition to 150 only numbered and stamped by The Slim Aarons Estate on verso. Supplied with certificate of authenticity. Gorgeous print measuring 30 x 40" inches / ca 76.2 x 101.6 cm’s paper size. Stamped by the Estate on right and numbered in ink on left - limited edition to 150 only. Produced utilising the original transparency held at archive source. FRAMING: Please note that this piece is unframed – however, we offer a full framing service. If you would like this piece framed, please contact us for a quote. We ship regularly using Fedex Express services and shipping to all international locations. Keywords snow white skiing Austria...
Category

1970s Modern Landscape Photography

Materials

C Print, Color

Outer Herbides, Scottland (Coastal Landscape w/Rainbows)
Located in Sante Fe, NM
Pentti Sammallahti is a benchmark figure in contemporary Finnish photography. His works depict nature eroded and broken down by civilization, but h...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Black and White Photography

Materials

Silver Gelatin

Cups no. 6, color photograph, limited edition, signed and numbered
Located in Sante Fe, NM
"Cups no. 6" is a color photograph, limited edition, signed and numbered by Thomas Jackson. Thomas Jackson's Emergent Behavior is inspired by the instinctual self-organizing systems...
Category

2010s Contemporary Color Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Traces (Stranger than Paradise) - analog, Polaroid, Contemporary
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Traces (Stranger than Paradise), diptych - 2005 128x126each, 128x260cm installed, Edition of 3. 2 analog C-Prints, hand-printed by the artist on Fuji Crystal Archive Paper, base...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Landscape Photography

Materials

Metal

Planes (Stranger than Paradise) 6 pieces - 122x183cm, Polaroid, 20th Century
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Planes (Stranger than Paradise) - 2001 57x56cm each plus 5 cm in between each print, installed 122x183cm, Edition of 10, 6 analog C-Prints, hand-printed by the artist on Fuji Cry...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Color Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Photographic Paper, C Print, Color, Polaroid

Art Deco Delano Hotel. Miami Beach Black and White Architectural landscape Photo
Located in Miami Beach, FL
The 'Miami Skin Series' it’s not a traditional collection of photos about the architecture of Miami and Miami Beach. It’s rather a quick journey between its own skin from the Art Dec...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Black and White Photography

Materials

Black and White, Archival Pigment

World Class Sailboats on the Open Seas, Classic, Horizontal, Minimalist
Located in US
"In Sync" The iconic super yachts Lionheart, Ranger, Rainbow, and Velsheda appear to work together to create a pattern where there was none in this timeless and classic black and white photograph...
Category

2010s Contemporary Black and White Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Warrior in Kenya Leading Camels Across Desert, Horizontal, Iconic
Located in US
"Arteti Leading Camels" In this iconic photograph, a Rendille warrior takes his camels to find water. It is part of his role to make sure that each animal has what they need, even ...
Category

2010s Contemporary Black and White Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Black Mountains, long exposure, black and white photography, limited edition
Located in Vienna, Vienna
Black and white fine art long exposure waterscape - landscape photography. Wild Atlantic coast of Scotland with the big mountains in the background. Archival pigment ink print, editi...
Category

2010s Abstract Black and White Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Digital Pigment

Ancient Views of Johor Photograph - Original Albumen Prints - 1890s
Located in Roma, IT
Views of Johor photograph is a set of 5 original vintage albumen prints on single cardboard: 25 x 34 cm. Size of photos: 2 of 10.5. x 15, 8 x 11 and on the rear 21.5 x 27.5 cm. Go...
Category

Late 19th Century Modern Figurative Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper

Mrs. Richards Darling [from Les Foxy Femmes] - Polaroid, Color
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Mrs. Richards Darling, 2019 (diptych) [From the series Les Foxy Femmes] 20x20cm each, 20x45cm installed, Edition of 30. Archival pigment prints, based on two original Polaroids on...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Color Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Color, Archival Pigment, Polaroid

Slim Aarons Estate Print - Bad Luck Gloria 1951
Located in London, GB
Slim Aarons Estate Print - Bad Luck Gloria 2nd April 1951: American actor Jose Ferrer (1912 – 1992) commiserates with Gloria Swanson after losing out in the contest for the Best Actress oscar, while the winner, Judy Holliday...
Category

1950s Modern Landscape Photography

Materials

Black and White, Silver Gelatin

Desert Dream - based on 2 Polaroids
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
'Desert Dream’ - 2016, 20 x 32,2 cm, edition 1/10, digital C-Print based on two Polaroids. Numbered and signed on the back by the artist. Artist Statement “Since my childhood days I always loved taking photos, but for unknown reasons instant film never really caught my attention. After I saw the works of a friend who happened to be a gifted Polaroid photographer, I was totally mesmerized and the desire to shoot with instant film constantly grew in me. But for as long as I can think music has always been my main preoccupation. I somehow always feel the need to create, but my focus shifted more and more from making music to instant photography and it grew into something much more fulfilling and pure. Sometimes, these two passions even come together when I am able to provide my photos for album artworks – this makes me incredibly happy. As I always have been very introverted and reclusive I often drift off into my own inner world. The dreamlike landscapes and surreal atmospheres in my work are the visualization and the result of these imaginations. Another influence on my photography is my essential need to travel the world. But I am not interested in documenting the places I see like they are but rather love to create otherworldly scenes by adding the dreamlike texture of instant film, serving me as a needful escape from reality.” Artist Biography Julia Beyer is an analogue photographer from Germany. She mainly works with instant film to express her inner visions that often show dreamlike landscapes and surreal atmospheres. After being more known for her musical endeavors as the singer of the dreampop band Chandeen, she began to delve into this photographic art form in 2014 and since then expands her portfolio continuously. Her work has been published in various international print and online publications. Since 2017, she is a member of the renowned "12:12 Project", a worldwide collective of female Polaroid photographers. Selected Press and Publications: Feature in “Photodarium” Calendar 2016, 2017 and 2018 (Germany) Print feature in Monochrome Mag issue four: Instant (Australia) Print feature in Double Exposure Zine, Issue 2 // Vacancy (USA) Shoot Film UK, Issue #001 “Overexposed” (UK) Feature in The Impossible Project Magazine Artwork photography...
Category

2010s Contemporary Color Photography

Materials

C Print, Color, Polaroid

Two Iconic, Large Elephants Walking Across Amboseli National Park, Wildlife
Located in US
"Titans of Time" The world’s two largest tusked elephants, Tim & Craig, can go months without crossing paths so seeing the two together is one of the most extraordinary sights in th...
Category

2010s Contemporary Black and White Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Andres: Monument Valley, Arizona 1968.
Located in Cologne, DE
Andres was born 1905 in Germany and passed away 1992. He started his career as a photographer in 1920. He was one of the first photographers, who used a Leica. His images today are d...
Category

1960s Modern Black and White Photography

Materials

Black and White

Mountain Ridge (Stranger than Paradise) - analog, vintage. mounted
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Mountain Range (Stranger than Paradise) - 1999 55x72cm, Edition 3/5, Analog C-Print, printed by the artist, based on a Polaroid. Mounted on Aluminum with matte UV-Protection. Art...
Category

1990s Contemporary Landscape Photography

Materials

Metal

Tulle no. 49_v2, Stinson Beach, CA
Located in Sante Fe, NM
The hovering installations featured in this ongoing series of photographs are inspired by self-organizing, "emergent" systems in nature such as termite mounds, swarming locusts, scho...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Color Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

At Dawn - Contemporary, Figurative, Woman, Landscape, Polaroid, Photograph, Blue
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
At Dawn - 2018, Print based on an original Polaroid on Hahnemühle photo rag paper, not mounted . 20x48cm, Edition of 10 plus 2 Artist Proofs. Signature label and certificate. Not m...
Category

2010s Contemporary Color Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Archival Ink, Color, Polaroid, Archival Pigment

Wildlife India Landscape Photograph Jungle Forest Black White Palm Tree Banyan
Located in Norfolk, GB
Aditya Dicky Singh Untitled Infrared photograph on fine-art Hahnemuhle archival paper 36" x 53" unframed (91cm x 135cm) 2017 Edition 1/10 Dicky’s images have enthralled many an...
Category

2010s Contemporary Black and White Photography

Materials

Archival Paper, Archival Ink

Elephants crossing, animal, wildlife, black and white photography, africa
Located in München, BY
Edition 5 more sizes on request A small elephant family is crossing the dry salt pan in Amboseli National Park in Kenya. The elephants have to walk over an hour through this very dr...
Category

2010s Contemporary Black and White Photography

Materials

Archival Pigment

Whirlwind. Sea Shelf close up. Large Color Photograph Mounted on Plexiglass
Located in Miami Beach, FL
Whirlwind Measures: 48" x 84" x 1 D C-print large color photograph mounted on plexiglass Dated and signed by the artist Unique. 2007 Born in Tehran and raised in Europe and the United States, Iran, Issa-Khan began her photography career in the late 1970s studying with William Minor, Jr. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, Issa-Khan photographed Paulina Porizkova...
Category

Early 2000s Minimalist Color Photography

Materials

Plexiglass, Archival Pigment

Morgan Library II, New York
Located in Los Angeles, CA
Morgan Library II New York 50 x 62.4 inches ed. of 10 $6000 60 x 74.9 inches ed. of 7 $9000 70 x 87.5 inches ed. of 5 $11000 signed and numbered on label, verso Paper is trimmed...
Category

2010s Conceptual Landscape Photography

Materials

C Print, Lambda

Rapids Below Vernal Fall, Yosemite, CA
Located in Pacific Grove, CA
This vintage silver gelatin contact print is signed in pencil on the front of the mount, with Portfolio One stamp and numbering in red crayon on the back of the mount. This print com...
Category

1940s Modern Black and White Photography

Materials

Silver Gelatin

Are you my Angel - Contemporary, Photograph, Landscape, 21st Century
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
Are you my Angel (2011)
 from the series Monuments 50 x 65 cm, Edition of 1/10 plus 2 Artist Proofs. Digital Photography printed on Canson Barita 310gr (not mou...
Category

2010s Contemporary Landscape Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Color, Archival Pigment

Sunrise Oak (8 x 10 inch hand-printed cyanotype)
Located in Oakland, CA
A solitary oak tree is backlit by the glow of sunrise at dawn along a trail. The scene is a hiking trail in the hills of Oakland, California. This is a one-off mini studio proof. A h...
Category

2010s Contemporary Landscape Photography

Materials

Paper, Archival Paper, Rag Paper, Photogram

Mists O’er The Loch by James Sparshatt Palladium Platinum Print with Float Frame
Located in Coltishall, GB
A frozen morning in the highlands of Scotland and the sun battles to emerge from the mists. James Sparshatt’s black and white landscapes have an ethereal beauty. They are moments w...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Landscape Photography

Materials

Platinum

Snowy Mountain - Vintage Photograph - 1930s
Located in Roma, IT
Snowy Mountain  is a color vintage photo, realized in 1930s. Good conditions and aged. It belongs to a historical and nostalgic album includ...
Category

1930s Contemporary Figurative Photography

Materials

Photographic Paper

Versilia 05 (Tuscany, Italy) by Bernhard Lang - Aerial beach photography
Located in Paris, FR
Versilia 05 is a limited-edition photograph by contemporary artist Bernhard Lang. This photograph is sold unframed as a print only. It is available in 3 dimensions: *60 cm × 79 cm ...
Category

2010s Contemporary Abstract Photography

Materials

C Print

Rainy Drugs Sign by Michael Ormerod - American Gritty Street Photography
Located in Brighton, GB
Rainy Drugs Sign by Michael Ormerod is available as an 8" x 10" print on Hahnemuhle paper from a limited edition of 10 prints. Featured in the 2024 posthumous solo exhibition, 'Mic...
Category

20th Century American Realist Black and White Photography

Materials

Black and White

Panorama of a Ghost River
Located in Sante Fe, NM
Influenced by late nineteenth-century expeditionary photographers such as Timothy O'Sullivan, who documented the "unexplored" territories of the West, Mark Klett visually explores these landscapes and the marks left on them by man. His images, like O'Sullivan's, have a human context - whether it be the lights of a city, a hat, foot or shadow jutting into the frame, or debris/artifacts left behind by ancient or modern passers-by. Working mostly in the desert Southwest...
Category

Early 2000s Contemporary Landscape Photography

Materials

Inkjet

Reed Crescendo, Eagle Nest Lake, New Mexico
Located in Sante Fe, NM
David Gibson is primarily a self-taught photographer. Years of developing and refining his photographic technique have afforded him much recognition. He has also photographed extensi...
Category

2010s Contemporary Landscape Photography

Materials

Silver Gelatin

Aspen Grove Forest - Black & White Landscape Photograph
Located in Soquel, CA
The beauty of nature's rhythm is captured in this black and white landscape photograph of a forest of Aspen trees by American photographer and film maker, John Henry Johnson (America...
Category

1970s American Realist Landscape Photography

Materials

Silver Gelatin, Photographic Paper

Esplanade with chestnut Trees, black and white, fine art, minimalism photography
Located in Vienna, Vienna
Black and white fine art landscape photography. Chestnut trees on the promenade in historic Gmunden, Austria. Archival pigment ink print as part of a limited edition of 7. All Gerald...
Category

21st Century and Contemporary Contemporary Black and White Photography

Materials

Archival Ink, Archival Paper, Archival Pigment

My own private Travel Diary - Bishop, CA - Autumn
Located in Morongo Valley, CA
My own private Travel Diary - Bishop, CA - Autumn - 2001, 20x29cm, Edition of 10, plus 2 Artist Proofs. Archival C-Print, based on a Polaroid Slide. Signature label and Certificate. Not mounted. LIFE’S A DREAM (The Personal World of Stefanie Schneider) by Mark Gisbourne Projection is a form of apparition that is characteristic of our human nature, for what we imagine almost invariably transcends the reality of what we live. And, an apparition, as the word suggests, is quite literally ‘an appearing’, for what we appear to imagine is largely shaped by the imagination of its appearance. If this sounds tautological then so be it. But the work of Stefanie Schneider is almost invariably about chance and apparition. And, it is through the means of photography, the most apparitional of image-based media, that her pictorial narratives or photo-novels are generated. Indeed, traditional photography (as distinct from new digital technology) is literally an ‘awaiting’ for an appearance to take place, in line with the imagined image as executed in the camera and later developed in the dark room. The fact that Schneider uses out-of-date Polaroid film stock to take her pictures only intensifies the sense of their apparitional contents when they are realised. The stability comes only at such time when the images are re-shot and developed in the studio, and thereby fixed or arrested temporarily in space and time. The unpredictable and at times unstable film she adopts for her works also creates a sense of chance within the outcome that can be imagined or potentially envisaged by the artist Schneider. But this chance manifestation is a loosely controlled, or, better called existential sense of chance, which becomes pre-disposed by the immediate circumstances of her life and the project she is undertaking at the time. Hence the choices she makes are largely open-ended choices, driven by a personal nature and disposition allowing for a second appearing of things whose eventual outcome remains undefined. And, it is the alliance of the chance-directed material apparition of Polaroid film, in turn explicitly allied to the experiences of her personal life circumstances, that provokes the potential to create Stefanie Schneider’s open-ended narratives. Therefore they are stories based on a degenerate set of conditions that are both material and human, with an inherent pessimism and a feeling for the sense of sublime ridicule being seemingly exposed. This in turn echoes and doubles the meaning of the verb ‘to expose’. To expose being embedded in the technical photographic process, just as much as it is in the narrative contents of Schneider’s photo-novel exposés. The former being the unstable point of departure, and the latter being the uncertain ends or meanings that are generated through the photographs doubled exposure. The large number of speculative theories of apparition, literally read as that which appears, and/or creative visions in filmmaking and photography are self-evident, and need not detain us here. But from the earliest inception of photography artists have been concerned with manipulated and/or chance effects, be they directed towards deceiving the viewer, or the alchemical investigations pursued by someone like Sigmar Polke. None of these are the real concern of the artist-photographer Stefanie Schneider, however, but rather she is more interested with what the chance-directed appearances in her photographs portend. For Schneider’s works are concerned with the opaque and porous contents of human relations and events, the material means are largely the mechanism to achieving and exposing the ‘ridiculous sublime’ that has come increasingly to dominate the contemporary affect(s) of our world. The uncertain conditions of today’s struggles as people attempt to relate to each other - and to themselves - are made manifest throughout her work. And, that she does this against the backdrop of the so-called ‘American Dream’, of a purportedly advanced culture that is Modern America, makes them all the more incisive and critical as acts of photographic exposure. From her earliest works of the late nineties one might be inclined to see her photographs as if they were a concerted attempt at an investigative or analytic serialisation, or, better still, a psychoanalytic dissection of the different and particular genres of American subculture. But this is to miss the point for the series though they have dates and subsequent publications remain in a certain sense unfinished. Schneider’s work has little or nothing to do with reportage as such, but with recording human culture in a state of fragmentation and slippage. And, if a photographer like Diane Arbus dealt specifically with the anomalous and peculiar that made up American suburban life, the work of Schneider touches upon the alienation of the commonplace. That is to say how the banal stereotypes of Western Americana have been emptied out, and claims as to any inherent meaning they formerly possessed has become strangely displaced. Her photographs constantly fathom the familiar, often closely connected to traditional American film genre, and make it completely unfamiliar. Of course Freud would have called this simply the unheimlich or uncanny. But here again Schneider almost never plays the role of the psychologist, or, for that matter, seeks to impart any specific meanings to the photographic contents of her images. The works possess an edited behavioural narrative (she has made choices), but there is never a sense of there being a clearly defined story. Indeed, the uncertainty of my reading here presented, acts as a caveat to the very condition that Schneider’s photographs provoke. Invariably the settings of her pictorial narratives are the South West of the United States, most often the desert and its periphery in Southern California. The desert is a not easily identifiable space, with the suburban boundaries where habitation meets the desert even more so. There are certain sub-themes common to Schneider’s work, not least that of journeying, on the road, a feeling of wandering and itinerancy, or simply aimlessness. Alongside this subsidiary structural characters continually appear, the gas station, the automobile, the motel, the highway, the revolver, logos and signage, the wasteland, the isolated train track and the trailer. If these form a loosely defined structure into which human characters and events are cast, then Schneider always remains the fulcrum and mechanism of their exposure. Sometimes using actresses, friends, her sister, colleagues or lovers, Schneider stands by to watch the chance events as they unfold. And, this is even the case when she is a participant in front of camera of her photo-novels. It is the ability to wait and throw things open to chance and to unpredictable circumstances, that marks the development of her work over the last eight years. It is the means by which random occurrences take on such a telling sense of pregnancy in her work. However, in terms of analogy the closest proximity to Schneider’s photographic work is that of film. For many of her titles derive directly from film, in photographic series like OK Corral (1999), Vegas (1999), Westworld (1999), Memorial Day (2001), Primary Colours (2001), Suburbia (2004), The Last Picture Show (2005), and in other examples. Her works also include particular images that are titled Zabriskie Point, a photograph of her sister in an orange wig. Indeed the tentative title for the present publication Stranger Than Paradise is taken from Jim Jarmusch’s film of the same title in 1984. Yet it would be dangerous to take this comparison too far, since her series 29 Palms (1999) presages the later title of a film that appeared only in 2002. What I am trying to say here is that film forms the nexus of American culture, and it is not so much that Schneider’s photographs make specific references to these films (though in some instances they do), but that in referencing them she accesses the same American culture that is being emptied out and scrutinised by her photo-novels. In short her pictorial narratives might be said to strip films of the stereotypical Hollywood tropes that many of them possess. Indeed, the films that have most inspired her are those that similarly deconstruct the same sentimental and increasingly tawdry ‘American Dream’ peddled by Hollywood. These include films like David Lynch’s Blue Velvet (1986), Wild at Heart (1990) The Lost Highway (1997), John Dahl’s The Last Seduction (1994) or films like Ridley Scott’s Thelma and Louise with all its girl-power Bonny and Clyde-type clichés. But they serve no more than as a backdrop, a type of generic tableau from which Schneider might take human and abstracted elements, for as commercial films they are not the product of mere chance and random occurrence. Notwithstanding this observation, it is also clear that the gender deconstructions that the characters in these films so often portray, namely the active role of women possessed of a free and autonomous sexuality (even victim turned vamp), frequently find resonances within the behavioural events taking place in Schneider’s photographs and DVD sequences; the same sense of sexual autonomy that Stefanie Schneider possesses and is personally committed to. In the series 29 Palms (first begun in 1999) the two women characters Radha and Max act out a scenario that is both infantile and adolescent. Wearing brightly coloured fake wigs of yellow and orange, a parody of the blonde and the redhead, they are seemingly trailer park white trash possessing a sentimental and kitsch taste in clothes totally inappropriate to the locality. The fact that Schneider makes no judgment about this is an interesting adjunct. Indeed, the photographic projection of the images is such that the girls incline themselves to believe that they are both beautiful and desirous. However, unlike the predatory role of women in say Richard Prince’s photographs, which are simply a projection of a male fantasy onto women, Radha and Max are self-contained in their vacuous if empty trailer and motel world of the swimming pool, nail polish, and childish water pistols. Within the photographic sequence Schneider includes herself, and acts as a punctum of disruption. Why is she standing in front of an Officers’ Wives Club? Why is Schneider not similarly attired? Is there a proximity to an army camp, are these would-be Lolita(s) Rahda and Max wives or American marine groupies, and where is the centre and focus of their identity? It is the ambiguity of personal involvement that is set up by Schneider which deliberately makes problematic any clear sense of narrative construction. The strangely virulent colours of the bleached-out girls stand in marked contrast to Schneider’s own anodyne sense of self-image. Is she identifying with the contents or directing the scenario? With this series, perhaps, more than any other, Schneider creates a feeling of a world that has some degree of symbolic order. For example the girls stand or squat by a dirt road, posing the question as to their sexual and personal status. Following the 29 Palms series, Schneider will trust herself increasingly by diminishing the sense of a staged environment. The events to come will tell you both everything and nothing, reveal and obfuscate, point towards and simultaneously away from any clearly definable meaning. If for example we compare 29 Palms to say Hitchhiker (2005), and where the sexual contents are made overtly explicit, we do not find the same sense of simulated identity. It is the itinerant coming together of two characters Daisy and Austen, who meet on the road and subsequently share a trailer together. Presented in a sequential DVD and still format, we become party to a would-be relationship of sorts. No information is given as to the background or social origins, or even any reasons as to why these two women should be attracted to each other. Is it acted out? Are they real life experiences? They are women who are sexually free in expressing themselves. But while the initial engagement with the subject is orchestrated by Schneider, and the edited outcome determined by the artist, beyond that we have little information with which to construct a story. The events are commonplace, edgy and uncertain, but the viewer is left to decide as to what they might mean as a narrative. The disaggregated emotions of the work are made evident, the game or role playing, the transitory fantasies palpable, and yet at the same time everything is insubstantial and might fall apart at any moment. The characters relate but they do not present a relationship in any meaningful sense. Or, if they do, it is one driven the coincidental juxtaposition of random emotions. Should there be an intended syntax it is one that has been stripped of the power to grammatically structure what is being experienced. And, this seems to be the central point of the work, the emptying out not only of a particular American way of life, but the suggestion that the grounds upon which it was once predicated are no longer possible. The photo-novel Hitchhiker is porous and the culture of the seventies which it might be said to homage is no longer sustainable. Not without coincidence, perhaps, the decade that was the last ubiquitous age of Polaroid film. In the numerous photographic series, some twenty or so, that occur between 29 Palms and Hitchhiker, Schneider has immersed herself and scrutinised many aspects of suburban, peripheral, and scrubland America. Her characters, including herself, are never at the centre of cultural affairs. Such eccentricities as they might possess are all derived from what could be called their adjacent status to the dominant culture of America. In fact her works are often sated with references to the sentimental sub-strata that underpin so much of American daily life. It is the same whether it is flower gardens and household accoutrements of her photo-series Suburbia (2004), or the transitional and environmental conditions depicted in The Last Picture Show (2005). The artist’s use of sentimental song titles, often adapted to accompany individual images within a series by Schneider, show her awareness of America’s close relationship between popular film and music. For example the song ‘Leaving on a Jet Plane’, becomes Leaving in a Jet Plane as part of The Last Picture Show series, while the literalism of the plane in the sky is shown in one element of this diptych, but juxtaposed to a blonde-wigged figure first seen in 29 Palms. This indicates that every potential narrative element is open to continual reallocation in what amounts to a story without end. And, the interchangeable nature of the images, like a dream, is the state of both a pictorial and affective flux that is the underlying theme pervading Schneider’s photo-narratives. For dream is a site of yearning or longing, either to be with or without, a human pursuit of a restless but uncertain alternative to our daily reality. The scenarios that Schneider sets up nonetheless have to be initiated by the artist. And, this might be best understood by looking at her three recent DVD sequenced photo-novels, Reneé’s Dream and Sidewinder (2005). We have already considered the other called Hitchhiker. In the case of Sidewinder the scenario was created by internet where she met J.D. Rudometkin, an ex-theologian, who agreed to her idea to live with her for five weeks in the scrubland dessert environment of Southern California. The dynamics and unfolding of their relationship, both sexually and emotionally, became the primary subject matter of this series of photographs. The relative isolation and their close proximity, the interactive tensions, conflicts and submissions, are thus recorded to reveal the day-to-day evolution of their relationship. That a time limit was set on this relation-based experiment was not the least important aspect of the project. The text and music accompanying the DVD were written by the American Rudometkin, who speaks poetically of “Torn Stevie. Scars from the weapon to her toes an accidental act of God her father said. On Vaness at California.” The mix of hip reverie and fantasy-based language of his text, echoes the chaotic unfolding of their daily life in this period, and is evident in the almost sun-bleached Polaroid images like Whisky Dance, where the two abandon themselves to the frenetic circumstances of the moment. Thus Sidewinder, a euphemism for both a missile and a rattlesnake, hints at the libidinal and emotional dangers that were risked by Schneider and Rudometkin. Perhaps, more than any other of her photo-novels it was the most spontaneous and immediate, since Schneider’s direct participation mitigated against and narrowed down the space between her life and the art work. The explicit and open character of their relationship at this time (though they have remained friends), opens up the question as the biographical role Schneider plays in all her work. She both makes and directs the work while simultaneously dwelling within the artistic processes as they unfold. Hence she is both author and character, conceiving the frame within which things will take place, and yet subject to the same unpredictable outcomes that emerge in the process. In Reneé’s Dream, issues of role reversal take place as the cowgirl on her horse undermines the male stereotype of Richard Prince’s ‘Marlboro Country’. This photo-work along with several others by Schneider, continue to undermine the focus of the male gaze, for her women are increasingly autonomous and subversive. They challenge the male role of sexual predator, often taking the lead and undermining masculine role play, trading on male fears that their desires can be so easily attained. That she does this by working through archetypal male conventions of American culture, is not the least of the accomplishments in her work. What we are confronted with frequently is of an idyll turned sour, the filmic clichés that Hollywood and American television dramas have promoted for fifty years. The citing of this in the Romantic West, where so many of the male clichés were generated, only adds to the diminishing sense of substance once attributed to these iconic American fabrications. And, that she is able to do this through photographic images rather than film, undercuts the dominance espoused by time-based film. Film feigns to be seamless though we know it is not. Film operates with a story board and setting in which scenes are elaborately arranged and pre-planned. Schneider has thus been able to generate a genre of fragmentary events, the assemblage of a story without a storyboard. But these post-narratological stories require another component, and that component is the viewer who must bring their own interpretation as to what is taking place. If this can be considered the upside of her work, the downside is that she never positions herself by giving a personal opinion as to the events that are taking place in her photographs. But, perhaps, this is nothing more than her use of the operation of chance dictates. I began this essay by speaking about the apparitional contents of Stefanie Schneider’s pictorial narratives, and meant at that time the literal and chance-directed ‘appearing’ qualities of her photographs. Perhaps, at this moment we should also think of the metaphoric contents of the word apparition. There is certainly a spectre-like quality also, a ghostly uncertainty about many of the human experiences found in her subject matter. Is it that the subculture of the American Dream, or the way of life Schneider has chosen to record, has in turn become also the phantom of it former self? Are these empty and fragmented scenarios a mirror of what has become of contemporary America? There is certainly some affection for their contents on the part of the artist, but it is somehow tainted with pessimism and the impossibility of sustainable human relations, with the dissolute and commercial distractions of America today. Whether this is the way it is, or, at least, the way it is perceived by Schneider is hard to assess. There is a bleak lassitude about so many of her characters. But then again the artist has so inured herself into this context over a long protracted period that the boundaries between the events and happenings photographed, and the personal life of Stefanie Schneider, have become similarly opaque. Is it the diagnosis of a condition, or just a recording of a phenomenon? Only the viewer can decide this question. For the status of Schneider’s certain sense of uncertainty is, perhaps, the only truth we may ever know.

1 Kerry Brougher (ed.), Art and Film Since 1945: Hall of Mirrors, ex. cat., The Museum of Contemporary Art (New York, 1996) 2 Im Reich der Phantome: Fotographie des Unsichtbaren, ex. cat., Städtisches Museum Abteiberg Mönchengladbach/Kunsthalle Krems/FotomuseumWinterthur, (Ostfildern-Ruit, 1997) 3 Photoworks: When Pictures Vanish – Sigmar Polke, Museum of Contemporary Art (Zürich-Berlin-New York, 1995) 4 Slavoj Žižek, The Art of the Ridiculous Sublime: On David Lynch’s Lost Highway, Walter Chapin Simpson Center for the Humanities, University of Washington, Seattle, Occasional Papers, no. 1, 2000. 5 Diane Arbus, eds. Doon Arbus, and Marvin Israel...
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