Zuma #30 1977

Curator: John Divola’s "Zuma #30," created in 1977, is part of a larger series. He worked in abandoned houses near the Zuma Beach, photographing interiors he had spray-painted. Editor: Abandoned and defaced—yet so ethereally beautiful. That window frames the sunset like a masterpiece. There's an oddly captivating tension. Curator: It’s interesting how Divola's work engages with the ideas of landscape while pushing the boundaries of what is traditionally considered 'pure' landscape photography. He’s manipulating the readymade environment. Think about the act of trespassing, of reclaiming these spaces, and marking them. The social and economic implications are there. Editor: Reclaiming, marking...yes, almost like an act of…vandalism imbued with artistic intent? The graffiti competes with, or maybe complements, the delicate beauty of the sky. It makes you question beauty, doesn't it? It feels performative somehow. Like he’s staging a dialogue between decay and sublime. Curator: Exactly! He's blurring those boundaries, staging an encounter. And that tension you feel? It’s deliberate. The act of spray-painting disrupts the passive consumption of landscape photography. It emphasizes labor, the artist's intervention, the deconstruction of idealized notions of beauty. It's no accident he was working at a time when ideas surrounding postmodernism were evolving. Editor: There is a kind of raw energy that comes from seeing those markings, yet softened by the tranquility of the sunset and that peachy horizon line. One can feel both violated and awestruck in one instant. So perhaps the key here lies less in choosing sides and instead recognizing all as one integral element. Curator: I completely agree, it’s the interplay, the relationship of those parts that creates that frisson. The spray paint is what forces that new vision. Editor: Looking at "Zuma #30" I now see the beauty that surfaces even in the midst of dilapidation; one simply needs to open up a little. Curator: Yes, or be shaken up a little! It seems this blend, the manufactured colliding with the observed and captured on film, has revealed more about value than first imagined.