ZURICH.- Alec Soth’s photography is firmly rooted in the tradition of Walker Evans, Robert Frank, and Stephen Shore. His depiction of the everyday confronts the ideals romanticized by American society; independence, freedom, religious devotion and individual expression. Through his 8 x 10 camera lens, Soth captures the extraordinary by exposing and utilizing the vernacular of the ordinary. The exhibition features 80 photographs: a selection from Alec Soth’s two acclaimed bodies of work, Sleeping by the Mississippi (1999-2002) and Niagara (2004-2005) will be presented along with a selection of images from the series Dog Days, Bogotá (2002-2003), and his ongoing project, Portraits.
Sleeping by the Mississippi: Evolving from a series of road trips along the Mississippi River in 2004, Alec Soth’s Sleeping by the Mississippi captures America’s iconic yet often neglected “third Coast “. Soth’s richly descriptive, large format color photographs describe an eclectic mix of individuals, landscapes, and interiors. Sensuous in detail and raw in subject, this series evokes a consistent mood of loneliness, longing and reverie.
Niagara: In the follow up to this critically acclaimed debut, Alec Soth turns his eye to another iconic body of water, Niagara Falls. But as with his photos of the Mississippi, Soth’s pictures of Niagara are less about natural wonder than human desire. Working over the course of two years on both the American and Canadian sides of the Falls, Soth’s richly detailed, and rigorously composed photographs depict newlyweds and naked lovers, motel parking lots and pawn shop wedding rings. Emphasizing various motifs associated with romance, he also includes a number of love letters from the subjects he photographed.
Dog Days, Bogotá: After completing the shooting of Sleeping by the Mississippi in 2002, Alec Soth traveled to Bogotá, Colombia to adopt a baby girl. While the courts processed paperwork, he and his wife spent two months in the capital city waiting to take their new baby home. Beauty makes itself known through ramshackle architecture, the companionship of animals, and the perseverance of the human spirit. Yet, in Dog Days, Bogotá (2007), Soth’s photographs transcend the simple description of beauty and poetically roam through a cast of strays, tough souls, and hints of hope.
Portraits: “(…) Soth’s latest work, a stunning array of color portraits, is drawn from all walks of Soth’s artistic life — from Magnum editorial assignments, private commissions, personal projects including From Here to There and Sleeping by the Mississippi, and discrete images gathered during art-related travel. His subjects include everyday strangers and celebrated authors and artists, whom he encountered throughout the United States and on recent travels to Iceland, Germany, Canada, Brazil, China, and Britain. (…) Soth is most interested in shooting what is new to him. Rarely does he photograph friends, family, or familiar surroundings. His vision is driven by curiosity. (…) Because of Soth’s remarkable ability to get a psychological read on his subjects, his pictures evoke interior landscapes — places filled with creative longing, determination, or brooding loneliness. (…)” (Cynde Randall)
Alec Soth (b. 1969) is a photographer born and based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He is the recipient of several major fellowships from the McKnight and Jerome Foundations and was awarded the 2003 Santa Fe Prize for Photography. His work is represented in major public and private collections, including the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Museum of Fine Arts Houston and the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis. Soth’s photographs have been featured in numerous solo and group exhibitions, including the 2004 Whitney and São Paulo Biennials. His first monograph, Sleeping by the Mississippi, was published by Steidl in 2004; his follow up, Niagara, was also published by Steidl and released in 2006. Soth is represented by the Gagosian Gallery in New York, the Weinstein Gallery in Minneapolis and the Magnum Gallery in Paris.
Alec Soth became a nominee of Magnum Photos in 2004 and an associate in 2006.
