New Argentea Exhibition – Out of the Woods of Thought
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A new collection of contemporary landscape photography opens at Argentea Gallery on 2nd November 2018. Out of the Woods of Thought is an exploration of the natural world through a series of highly atmospheric works by some of the UK’s most exciting landscape photographers.
The exhibition is curated by the photography collective ‘Inside the Outside’ and features work by its founding members Al Brydon, Rob Hudson, Stephen Segasby and Joseph Wright whose collective philosophy relate to the landscape and informs their representation of it in photographic form. Complementing this philosophy is work by a number of handpicked guest exhibitors that include Lynda Laird, Tom Wilkinson, J.M. Golding, Brian David Stevens and Guy Dickinson.
Rob Hudson explains: “The images are not simply representations of the landscape but a highly personal engagement with place that goes beyond the literal. These are photographs that have come into being, in Edward Thomas’s phrase, “out of the woods of thought”. They take an idea, story or metaphor and make them visible through a combination of imagination and the photographic print.”
Various themes are explored throughout the works. Al Brydon’s Solargraphs reveal an element of the landscape that we all take for granted – time itself. The exposures in this work are so long they become a reflection upon our lives and our short tenure on this world.
Rob Hudson continues: “Finding new ways to engage with the landscape and to express that engagement is key for us. The simple depiction of the landscape as a beautiful untarnished place empty of people and its histories does not tell a whole truth. For if we’re to get out of the woods of the multiple threats of climate change, collapsing biodiversity and the loss of knowledge about, and appreciation of the land, we need to remind people why the land is precious to them.”
Argentea Gallery owner Jennie Anderson comments: “I am so pleased to showcase this extraordinary exhibition in Birmingham. It includes some tremendously moving works, and it is wonderful to present such an accomplished compilation of work by diverse, yet complementary, photographers.”