An Experts Eye: Rick Wester

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While browsing the booths with us at the third annual Photo New York fair, Wester shared his thoughts on specific works; commented on the impact of postmodernism on photography; and discussed the relative merits of buying at art fairs vs. auctions.

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On Pieter Hugo’s Untitled 3, from the series “Rwanda 2004: Vestiges of a Genocide” on view at the Stephen Cohen Gallery (Los Angeles)

The first question that I thought of when I saw these was, “What can I believe about these pictures?” They are horrific images, in many respects, but I don’t know if they are “real” or not. The closer I look at them, the more they appear to be constructions of some sort, but I can’t tell.

Are they really fossilized remains, or are they the work of an artist that’s being documented in photography? The title is so loaded that if they are just photographs of sculptures they get to the root of what a lot of contemporary art—and not just photography—is about. What happens in contemporary art is about the experience of the viewer. Very often it has nothing to do with the work itself. Craft doesn’t matter that much any more, technique doesn’t necessarily matter. It’s really about what goes on in your head in terms of processing [the image].

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On Jo Broughton's My Ex-Boyfriend's Girlfriends at Vara-Kuelbs Projects (New York)

These four pictures are of four people each lying on a bed. And you get it immediately. It’s the same set-up, the same angle of view, the same lighting, the same background. So what you become interested in are the differences. You can trace this idea back to August Sander. You become fascinated by the differences between people because that’s what he was interested by. The idea of photography as inventory-taking, as cataloging the world, is still a very potent idea. I like the fact that I’m seeing somebody thinking that way.

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On Sheila Pree Bright’s photographs from the series Suburbia at Charles Guice Fine Art Photography (Berkeley, Calif.)

I’m very impressed with these two pictures. I have to admit complete ignorance of who this artist is. But even though we’re only seeing two pictures from an artist’s body of work, I’m immediately impressed by how clearly they convey what her interest is. They’re convincing. That’s the mark of somebody who knows what they’re doing and who is talented enough to get their idea across. That’s the mark of a good photographer.

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On Photo New York

There’s an incredibly diverse selection of images, of approaches and of methods. I have to admit that I have no idea who a lot of the artists are, but I’m seeing work that is interesting in a lot of different ways. At a fair like this, there’s probably more work that you can get for hundreds of dollars as opposed to tens of thousands of dollars.

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On Contemporary Photography

A lot of my peers in the field who grew up with photography in the same way I did immediately dismiss a lot of contemporary photography. But the fact of the matter is that a lot of contemporary photography wrestles with the same issues that conventional Modernist photography did.

I’m interested in how photographers deal with the notion of just being a photographer nowadays. What do you do after Walker Evans? What do you do after Diane Arbus? What I’m consistently looking for in contemporary work is whether an artist brings something to the medium that’s just a little bit different, that’s a twist.

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On Video

I wouldn’t proclaim myself to be an expert in video, but I’ve had enough exposure to it. And I was surprised to discover that I liked it more than I ever thought I would. I worked for Larry Gagosian for a year, and we did a couple of video shows and they really blew my mind. And what I discovered about video was that a lot of the things that happen in good still photography happen in good video. Good video can twist your mind in the same way that a good photograph can.