Lars Tunbjork
dal 8/2/2007 al 4/4/2007
Segnalato da
8/2/2007
Lars Tunbjork
Open Eye Gallery, Liverpool
The artist photographs the spaces, such as the office and home, in which we choose or are compelled to spend most of our time. The exhibition features three recent bodies of work - Office, Dom Alla and Madrid 2004 - all of which explore the changes brought about to modern urban life by consumerism and globalization.
Open Eye Gallery is proud to present the first solo show in the UK of the work of Swedish photographer Lars Tunbjörk. Tunbjörk’s photographs portray aspects of modern urban life, above all issues related to the spaces in which many of us spend most of our lives: the office and the home. This exhibition features three recent bodies of work: Office, Dom Alla and Madrid 2004.
In Office (2001) Lars Tunbjörk looks at the world of office work in Japan, North America and Sweden. His images present a uniform workplace, bleakly furnished and banal, the inhabitants of which struggle to express their individuality. Dom Alla (All Those, 2002) is a journey through the Swedish welfare system. Working in five cities across Sweden, Tunbjörk met and photographed people in welfare offices, shelters for homeless people, and drug rehabilitation units. The last series, Madrid 2004, focuses on the presence of nature in our built environment. These photographs were shot in newly-built residential spaces on the outskirts of Madrid, where the only remnants of nature are the weeds that survive in cracks in the sidewalk or peep out from beneath rocks. Tunbjörk also examines our attempts to recreate nature in paltry gardens and decorative borders, examples of the developers’ disdain for anything that is peripheral to their drive for profit.
Tunbjörk points his lens at the ordinary - an office carpet, a flower bed, a birthday cake bathed in fluorescent light. With humour and humanity he examines our attempts to create a better, or at least a bearable, world. His work is full of melancholy, presenting a ruin of the recent past and a way of life in jeopardy.
Lars Tunbjörk was born in 1956 in Borås, on the Swedish West coast, and is now based in Stockholm. He is one of Sweden’s most respected photographers and a frequent contributor to leading international journals, including the New York Times. He is a member of the photography agency VU in Paris.
Artist Talk: Friday 9 February 12.30pm
Lars Tunbjörk will be in the gallery to introduce his exhibition and talk about his unique approach to colour documentary photography, with opportunities for questions and discussion.
Free event
Open Eye Gallery
28-32 Wood Street Liverpool L1 4AQ
Opening Times:
Tuesday-Saturday 10.30am - 5.30pm
Closed Sundays and Mondays
Admission is free