Curated by: Karen Love

September 4, 7:30pm | Opening Reception

Chick Rice began her cameraless photographs of plants and "unusual people" in 1980 in a series she called "Living Proof." Working in the dark, she positioned her subjects in front of large sheets of photographic paper, then recorded their silhouettes by lighting the composition so that their cast shadows were registered on the paper. This photogrpahic technique, which used no camera or film, derives from the time of photography's invention when Henry Fox Talbot laid flowers and leaves of plants on sensitized paper and exposed the arrangements to the sun to make his photographic drawings. The photogram processed was revived around 1920 by Lazlo Mohony Nagy, Man Ray and other members of the surrealistic movement exploring the photographic medium.

While Rice borrowed Talbot's botanical studies aspart of her imagery, the character of her work compared more closely with the ideological considerations of the later avant-garde photographers. Her aim is less to create a replica than to use the photogram, or shadowgram, as she calls it, as a symbolic gesture.

Supported by the Canada Council.

A catalogue was published by Presentation House Gallery in conjunction with the exhibition, with an essay by Martha Hanna.

Touring Exhibition

Southern Alberta Art Gallery, Lethbridge, AB - Jan. 30 - March 3, 1988

Whyte Museum of the Canadian Rockies, Banff, AB - March 22 - May 1, 1988

The Floating Gallery, Winnipeg, MN - May 31 - June 18, 1988

Galerie VU, Quebec City, QC - Sept. 14 - Oct. 9, 1988

Gallery TPW, Toronto, ON - Oct 29 - Dec. 3, 1988