Untitled 262, 263, 070 1999

Carl Chiarenza made this photographic work, Untitled 262, 263, 070, with gelatin silver prints, and I’m really struck by how he builds up his image. The layering feels like a painterly process, almost like he’s collaging different textures and tones to create a landscape of the mind. I love the materiality here: the deep blacks and shining silvers create a real drama. The way he plays with light and shadow, you can almost feel the textures. It reminds me of a landscape, but also something much more abstract and internal. There’s one layer near the top that looks like a mountain range made out of crumpled foil, so tactile, yet so dreamlike. Chiarenza's work reminds me a little bit of some of the experimental photography of someone like László Moholy-Nagy, who also pushed the boundaries of the medium. But Chiarenza has this uniquely personal and almost mystical vision that I find deeply compelling. He shows us that art is never about fixed answers, but about the endless possibilities of seeing.