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David Halliday
Lilies & Plantains: Sepia Toned Still Life Photograph of Flowers and Fruit

2003

About the Item

Formalist sepia toned still life photograph of white lily flowers and brown plantains on a tabletop Lilies and Plantains, by David Halliday, printed in 2003 Sepia toned silver gelatin print, ed. 11/25 Framed in black washed wood frame with protective UV non-glare glass 8 x 10 inch image, 17.5 x 21.5 inches framed Excellent condition, ready to hang "Lilies and Plantains" is a sepia-toned silver gelatin print by photographer, David Halliday. With this Formalist style image of white lilies and plantains on a simple tabletop, Halliday highlights the subject's pure form and calls attention to the beauty found in overlooked objects of domestic life. This intimately sized print is complemented with a black washed wood framed, handmade by the artist. About the work: The designation “still life” implicitly suggests one of the goals of both painters and photographers dedicated to the genre: they want to imbue the inanimate objects they depict with the vibrancy of life despite the immobility of the medium. Like the great painters of still life—Zurbarán, Chardin, Cézanne, Morandi—Halliday charges his fruits, vegetables, and other objects with a poised intensity that intrigues us partly because possible meanings are just out of reach. David Halliday reaches into his archives of images to compile a selection of both sepia toned photographs mixed with more recent color works; each are iconic representations of the most ordinary objects of everyday life. Together they represent a fading essence of things quintessentially ‘American’. For the artist, beauty and nostalgia are pervasive, but lamentation has its role as well. About the artist: David Halliday first gained renown for his sepia-toned silver prints of elegant, meticulously-composed still lifes. His more recent color work maintains the same intimate and simple beauty but also creates a visceral connection for the viewer. Like a painter, he emphasizes volumes, balances, texture and areas of subtle shading. David Halliday sets himself apart from the bulk of contemporary photographic practice in several ways. Along with Aaron Rose and Sally Mann, he is one of the art photographers to have resisted adopting the new digital technology that produces instant color images. He develops his silver gelatin prints by hand, and his only technical departure from the standard black-and-white approach is to tone his pictures with sepia. Doing so connects him with the Photo-Secession movement launched by Alfred Stieglitz just over a century ago, when, in a different context, photographers with serious artistic goals tried to distinguish their work from aesthetically deficient examples of photography dominating the market in that day. Stieglitz’s associates were also trying to equal or surpass the quality of turn-of-the-century painting, which, in 1905, meant avoiding the documentary, signboard realism characteristic of most non-portrait photography of the era immediately preceding them. They wanted to prove that photography was indeed an art, and that its images could embody qualities of design and subtle evocation as successfully as Impressionist painting did. As painting underwent and reflected the political and technological shocks of the 20th century, art photography, too, moved away from the Photo-Secessionist ideal toward something more startling and abrasive, often serving social causes by documenting human suffering in various parts of the globe. Surrealist photographers stage-managed and manipulated their pictures so as to produce imagery that seemed to belong to the uncanny arena of dreams or nightmares. Halliday, though he recalls the meditative refinement of the Photo-Secessionists, has drawn as well on Surrealist aesthetics to arrive at his imagery. Born in Glen Cove, New York in 1958, Halliday attended Syracuse University and pursued further studies under the tutelage of Arnold Newman. He has exhibited widely in solo and group exhibitions throughout the United States and Europe. In 2002, the Contemporary Arts Center in New Orleans exhibited a retrospective of his work and in 2012, he exhibited at the Ogden Museum of Southern Art, New Orleans. Halliday’s work is included in numerous public and private collections including the New Orleans Museum of Art; the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, and the New Britain Museum of Art.
  • Creator:
    David Halliday (1958, American)
  • Creation Year:
    2003
  • Dimensions:
    Height: 17.5 in (44.45 cm)Width: 21.5 in (54.61 cm)Depth: 1 in (2.54 cm)
  • More Editions & Sizes:
    edition of 25, 8 x 10 inches unframedPrice: $1,200
  • Medium:
  • Movement & Style:
  • Period:
  • Condition:
  • Gallery Location:
    Hudson, NY
  • Reference Number:
    1stDibs: LU2276371432
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