Dafna Talmor’s Constructed Landscapes, featured in a new show at Photofusion, is an ongoing project that stems from the artist’s personal archive of photographs initially shot as mere keepsakes across different locations that include Venezuela, Israel, the US and UK. Produced by collaging medium format colour negatives, the process relies on experimentation, involving several incisions and configurations before a right match is achieved.
“This is my first solo show in the UK. I’ve been working from the same archive of images of Venezuela, Israel, California and the UK that I’ve accumulated over the years, while also adding more images. Lots of photographers go to specific place to do a shoot, it’s all very considered, whereas I’ll say “I’m going here, so I’ll take my camera.” But obviously what I look for now, because I know I’m feeding my archive, is much more considered than it was. I try never to give away an image’s location through its title, so that the photos don’t become about any particular place, but rather create a completely new space. Yet I find that people tend to be very curious about the locations: it’s almost as though, as much as they want to travel in their minds to somewhere that might not exist, they still need to know where they are, to be rooted somehow.
“Most of the prints won’t be behind glass, not even non-reflective glass: I think it’s important to be able to get very close to the image, especially when, for example, what you see, which looks like the inside of a cave, is actually the roots of a tree turned upside down. With these new landscapes I’m also playing with the standard format of the photographic negative, stretching it, making it more elongated and vertical, or panoramic, because I have the freedom of building it in whatever way I want.
“Constructed Landscapes” runs at Photofusion, 17A Electric Lane, London SW9 8LA until 6 April. The artist will be in conversation on 30 March. The exhibition and accompanying events have been funded by Arts Council England.
