City Lights 1964

Curator: Anneliese Hager's "City Lights," a gelatin silver print, presents an immediate sense of urban decay, doesn't it? Editor: Yes, the monochromatic palette lends a ghostly air. It feels less like a celebration of urbanity and more like a spectral record of its disintegration. I'm drawn to the texture. Curator: Note how the artist manipulates the photographic process. The layering and blurring obscure representational clarity, pushing the medium toward abstraction. This disrupts conventional photographic realism. Editor: Indeed, the materiality is key. The grainy texture and high contrast suggest experimentation with the chemical processes, perhaps solarization or deliberate underdevelopment. The tactile quality emphasizes process over pristine image. Curator: Precisely. The semiotic reading becomes complex; the city, usually a symbol of progress, is fractured, almost illegible. It challenges the viewer to question the inherent optimism often associated with urban landscapes. Editor: I agree. Hager's work exposes the labor and materials that construct not only the image but also our perception of the city, demanding we look beyond the surface of both. Curator: A successful disruption of expectations, then, transforming the familiar into something unsettling and thought-provoking. Editor: Precisely, revealing the unseen labor and materials shaping our urban experiences.