SANDI FELLMAN DECEPTION

Sept 28-Nov 30, 2013

This new work by Sandi Fellman is the most recent in a series entitled, “Deception,” which debuted at KMR Arts gallery in 2011. Fellman transforms singular flowers and insects into abstract studies of shape, color and form. Simultaneously, these images are a 21st century play on 19th century botanical and entomological illustrations. The required facts and details of naturalist illustrations are replaced by a contemporary, modernist vision of fleeting moments, butterflies on the move, glimpses of flowers, and a purposeful abstraction.

Fellman reflects on her work:

Photographs from the series “Deception” loosely explore the visual ambiguity and interconnections between plants and insects. The 20th century French philosopher Deleuze, writes extensively on “the orchid and the wasp”, cross pollination, sexual deception. Deleuze refers to an “origami cosmos” constantly in a state of folding, unfolding, and refolding. These ideas have created a structural framework for this work. In the end, it is the isolation of the intense fragile beauty of the subjects, and the infinite ways in which they resemble each other that compels and moves me to make these images.

Grace Glueck wrote of Fellman’s work in the New York Times: “Ms. Fellman’s poetic ways with the camera have been evident in earlier series of pictures, and these photographs continue the delicate less-is-more elegance that has characterized her work. Nor has her skill abated in conveying the core of her deceptively simple subject matter.”

Fellman’s photographs are in numerous permanent collections including The Museum of Modern Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, La Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, France, The Los Angeles County Museum of Art, The Houston Museum of Art. Chado Ralph Rucci, Bill Blass, Saks Fifth Avenue, Clinique, Countess Lucienne Von Doz and Charlotte Moss number among Fellman’s commercial clients. 

Also included in Sandi Fellman’s exhibition will be her own ceramics in the form of bowls and vessels. Fellman says, “I have always been interested in ceramics and the process of transformation that takes place when the raw, shapeless clay becomes a more permanent object.” During the last two years, Fellman has been learning about ceramics, studying at the prestigious and historic Greenwich House Pottery in New York City. Fellman feels that although her passion for ceramics is relatively recent, it is, without question, a complementary creative direction to her almost 40 years as a photographer. “I respond to the visceral and sensual aspects of ceramics as a compelling counterpoint to my photography,” Fellman eloquently states. 

KMR Arts owner, Kathy McCarver Root says of the exhibition, “Sandi Fellman’s photographs have mesmerized me for years; her Deception series is deeply sensual and totally modern. It is abundantly clear that the same artist’s aesthetic is informing both the eye and the hand within the disciplines of both photography and ceramics. There is a wonderful dialogue between Sandi’s bowls and her photographs.”