I. Bodies of Work /

room room

Installation view, Dark Matter, Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki, 2016. Photograph by Sam Hartnett.

2008

Artist Ann Shelton’s new series Room Room consistently uses the circular pictorial format, which can be linked by association to an aperture, convex mirror, fisheye, keyhole, peephole, porthole, or vignette. Shelton thus incorporates a willful distortion that calls attention to the image as a concerted representation. In recent years, Shelton has created images that she subsequently installed in the manner of a diptych, thereby allowing the photographs to play with notions of doubling and reflection. In her use of this technique of display, available vantage points become manifold and the reversed images reiterate how artificial [and artful] any specific grouping of images is bound to be. Shelton does not attempt to create a portrait of naturalised vision, but instead — and more intriguingly — builds her works as strategic, layered constructions.
Martin Patrick, Vantage points and vanishing spaces
Phoenix block, room # unknown [yellow walls], 2008. C type print 84 x 119 cm.
Phoenix block, room # unknown [veneer door], 2008. C type print, 84 x 119 cm.
Phoenix block, room #67, 2008. C type print, 84 x 119 cm.
Phoenix block, room #65, 2008. C type print, 84 x 119 cm.
Phoenix block, room #66, 2008. C type print, 84 x 119 cm.
Phoenix block, room #63, 2008. C type print, 84 x 119 cm.
Phoenix block, room #60, 2008. C type print, 84 x 119 cm.
Phoenix block, room #62, 2008. C type print, 84 x 119 cm.
Phoenix block, room #61, 2008. C type print, 84 x 119 cm.
Phoenix block, room #57, 2008. C type print, 84 x 119 cm.
Phoenix block, room #59, 2008. C type print, 84 x 119 cm.
Phoenix block, room #58, 2008. C type print, 84 x 119 cm.
Phoenix block, room #56, 2008. C type print, 84 x 119 cm.
Phoenix block, room #55, 2008. C type print, 84 x 119 cm.
Phoenix block, room #54, 2008. C type print, 84 x 119 cm.
Phoenix block, room #51, 2008. C type print, 84 x 119 cm.
Phoenix block, room #52, 2008. C type print, 84 x 119 cm.
Phoenix block, room #53, 2008. C type print, 84 x 119 cm.
Phoenix block, room # unknown [pink wallpaper], 2008. C type print, 84 x 119 cm.
Phoenix block, room # unknown [blue walls], 2008. C type print, 84 x 119 cm.
Phoenix block, room # unknown [blue bed], 2008. C type print, 84 x 119 cm.
Installation view, Dark Matter, Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki, 2016. Photograph by Sam Hartnett.
Installation view, Dark Matter, Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki, 2016. Photograph by Sam Hartnett.
Installation view, City Gallery Wellington, 2008.
Installation view, City Gallery Wellington, 2008.
Installation view, City Gallery Wellington, 2008.
Installation view, McNamara Gallery, 2008.
Installation view, McNamara Gallery, 2008.
Installation view, McNamara Gallery, 2008.
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