Home People Exhibitions Venues Images About

Jeff Wall

Born, 1946 in Vancouver, Canada

From the archived Documenta 11 website : www.documenta12.de//archiv/d11/data/english/index.html

“Jeff Wall began developing his own artistic work in the 1970s following a degree in art history. Wall’s ‘conceptual photography’ is closely related to conceptual art of this time yet disregards the intrinsic taboo of the image. In 1978, he began working with large-format slides in light boxes. His images tell stories whose depiction - mostly of everyday scenes - alternates from seemingly casual portrayal to theatrical mise-en- scenes, moments of climactic crises, and deliberate breaks with supposed reality. The choice of people and places follows an intuitive yet systematic search for a contemporary typology. He depicts suburbs, industrialized landscapes, nocturnal streets, and isolated people; the dark side of a rationalized, ethnically and socially fragmented society in which the future is uncertain. Departing from a cultural memory, many of his works incorporate art historical and literary references that suggest a fusion of the present and the past. The urban or domestic scenarios are set, details and characters are captured in time-consuming individual takes and only brought together as an entire image during the montage process.”