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SUBLIME SPACES
Opening reception: Saturday, March 21st, 6-8pm
The artist will be present
MICHAEL LIPKIN | Central Synagogue, New York, March 2014 Archival Pigment Print | 70 x 40 inches framed | Edition of 6
212GALLERY is pleased to present Sublime Spaces, an exhibition of new and recent photography by acclaimed architect and multi-media artist Michael Lipkin.
As the artist states, "Architecture exists to accommodate and even elevate the human experience. I attempt to capture the extended moment of the interaction between architectural space and human experience – where the subject and the object collide and architecture is transformed into a sustained subjective experience for the viewer."
Synagogues, churches, temples, shrines and other spiritual structures have offered enduring inspiration for humanity throughout the course of civilization. In communist countries, governmental offices replace religious houses as the pinnacle of architectural achievement. With Sublime Spaces, Lipkin turns his lens to a variety of these architectural monuments, which in turn represent the highest aspirations of our collective earthly agenda.
Lipkin writes that, "This work explores the transformative power of iconic architectural space and the sensory perception of being there. These photographs re-create the visceral, subjective experience of being within a great space, empowered by its architecture and history. Form and mass is deconstructed into light, time and movement in pursuit of its structure and purpose, its genius loci, its sense of place and possibility."
MICHAEL LIPKIN | Capitol Havanna, 2009
Archival Pigment Print | 27 x 40 inches | Edition of 6
Michael Lipkin was born in Pennsylvania in 1950. He received his BA in Architecture and Sculpture from the University of Pennsylvania and his Master of Architecture degree from Yale University. His work has been exhibited at the Aspen Institute, at Kim Foster Gallery in New York City and at 212GALLERY in Aspen. He currently lives and works in Aspen.
To receive additional information or for details and pricing of available works, please contact the gallery.
MICHAEL LIPKIN | St. Johns, Cambridge, 2014 Archival Pigment Print | 60 x 40 inches | Edition of 6
MICHAEL LIPKIN | Maria Magiorie, Rome, 2012 Archival Pigment Print | 60 x 40 inches | Edition of 6
MICHAEL LIPKIN | Central Synagogue #2, New York, March 2014 Archival Pigment Print | 40 x 60 inches framed | Edition of 6
212GALLERY
525 EAST COOPER AVENUE
ASPEN, COLORADO 81611
970.925.7117
info@212gallery.com | www.212gallery.com
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Sublime Spaces.
Deconstructing the Physical in search of the Metaphysical.
I have spent my life looking at, thinking about, studying, and pursuing architecture and the making and meaning of place. For the past 5 years I have been taking photographs of sublime spaces. While many are sacred spaces, created to celebrate a particular religion, it is not the religion that attracts me. I am drawn to the extraordinary architecture empowered by people’s loftiest aspirations. I am making images that draw you inward and towards the future, the possible, where the known slips into the unknown, and we are astonished.
These photographs re-create the visceral, subjective experience of being within a great space, empowered by architecture and history. Form and mass are deconstructed into light, time and movement in pursuit of structure and purpose, of genius loci.
Architecture exists to accommodate and elevate the human experience.
I am interested in the resonance of the lives lived within the walls of great buildings and public spaces. I am interested in the aspirations that have been realized in the construction and use of these buildings.
The images are active, and my process is active as well. I am constantly adjusting shutter speed, aperture, focus, and focal length. I am seldom standing still. I move through the space, experiencing the space. The work is minimally cropped with no post-production manipulation of images.
Michael Lipkin is represented by the 212 Gallery in Aspen and at the Kim Foster Gallery. His work was most recently exhibited in Aspen in 2013 at The Aspen Institute Art Gallery. Michael Lipkin received his undergraduate degree in architecture and sculpture from the University of Pennsylvania and a Master of Architecture degree from Yale.
Poetics of Space
Paepkce Gallery - Aspen Institute
My work explores the transformative power of iconic, civic architectural space and the sensory perception of being there. These 14 photographs re-create the visceral, subjective experience of being within a great space, empowered by its architecture and history. Form and mass is deconstructed into light, time and movement in pursuit of its structure and purpose, its genius loci, its sense of place and possibility.
I am interested in the resonance of the lives lived within the walls of great buildings and public spaces. I am interested in the aspirations that have been realized in the construction and use of these buildings.
I am interested in the transformative power of empowered architectural space and the experience of being there - moving through it, all senses informed, of the present. A visceral experience – our body senses and transforms a physical space, an object, into a heightened subjective experience. This can happen in a 500 year old church, Times Square, or the Boston Public Library.
Architecture exists to accommodate and even elevate the human experience, and in the case of sacred and civic spaces – a place for our most powerful and profound experiences. I attempt to capture the extended moment of the interaction between architectural space and human experience – where the subject and the object collide and the architectural object is transformed into a sustained subjective experience for the viewer.
This work is the opposite of still photography, not only are the images active, the process is active as well. I am constantly adjusting shutter speed, aperture, focus, and focal length – often these adjustments are made during long exposures. I am seldom standing still. I move through the space, experiencing the space. The photographs are minimally cropped with no post-production manipulation of images.
I am an optimistic agnostic, skeptical about religion, believing we are inherently spiritual - wired for the possibility of getting outside ourselves, wired for transcendence.
Memory Spirituality
Perception (Being There)
Place (Genius Loci) Physics (Light and Time)
Recent:
Sacred Spaces
February 14 - March 15 2013
Kim Foster Gallery
529 West 20th Street, NY
Statement: I am interested in the transformative power of sacred architectural space and the experience of being there - moving through it, using it, all senses informed, opened up, and paying attention - acutely of the present. It is a visceral, physical experience, we are aware of phenomenon – our body senses and transforms a physical space, an object, into a heightened subjective experience. You are within a great work, an empowered space.
I am interested in the resonance of the lives lived within its walls. I am interested in the aspirations that have been realized in the construction of these buildings as well as the aspirations of its users – to imagine the unimaginable, to witness the sacred.
My work attempts to deconstruct the form and mass of empowered architectural space into a perception of light, time and movement in pursuit of its genius loci – its sacred sense of place and possibility.
Being There
New Work 2010 - 2012
212 Gallery. Aspen. Summer 2012
This work focuses on the discovery of the interaction between architecture and expirence. It attempts to move beyond the conventional definition of architecture as a visual art, which exists first in the imagination, then in design documents, then as bricks and mortar, and finally photographed like fashion from it’s most attractive angle, to be celebrated in magazines. And while this is the process of creating architecture, it is only its birth, not its purpose.
Architecture exists to accommodate and even elevate the human experience, and in the case of sacred and civic spaces – a place for our most compelling events.
Architecture at its most inspired is theater – visual at first, but as we move through it, drawing on all our other senses – music and movement, distorting our sense of time and allowing us to transcend the bricks and mortar of architecture as it shares its history and purpose and allows us to experience a subjective meaning. It’s where we go to celebrate, to wonder at the possible, and glimpse the impossible.
I attempt to capture the extended moment of the interaction between architectural space and human experience – where the subject and the object collide, where they dance and our thoughts recede and we are astonished.
This work is the opposite of still photography, not only are the images active, the process is active as well. I am constantly adjusting shutter speed, aperture, focus, and focal length – often these adjustments are made during long exposures. I am seldom standing still. I move through the space, experiencing the space – the camera my companion. The work is minimally cropped with no post-production manipulation of images.
SUBLIMATION
Active and Moving Pictures
New Work 2010 - 2011
212 Gallery. Aspen. Summer 2011
This work is a pairing of short films and the photographs that are used as source material for the films.
The work begins with sculptures or constructions that I make and then photograph (active pictures). These images are then used to create short films (moving pictures). This process fosters a transformation from the object to the ephemeral – from the physicality of three dimensions to an experience of light, time, and movement. The object is transformed to a subjective experience.
I want materials and media to be the opposite of what they are supposed to be. I want sculpture to move – to change. I want photo-unrealism. I want photographs that move – that change. I want to create still life’s that aren’t still. I want light not to illuminate objects but for objects to illuminate light. I don’t want to stop time in the traditional photographic sense, I want to see time, I want to see time change. I want to witness the transformative.
Michael Lipkin is an architect, photographer, sculptor, video artist and dj. With this collection he brings his understanding of composition (sculpture), light and choreography (architecture), and time and movement (music) to create a unique body of work and offer a glimpse of a layered process that celebrates his personal obsession with an interaction between the arts and with a balance between control, experimentation, and discovery. He relishes his ability to surprise himself
Michael Lipkin received his undergraduate degree in sculpture from the University of Pennsylvania and a Master of Architecture degree from Yale. He is represented by the 212 Gallery in Aspen and the Kim Foster Gallery in New York.