Abelardo Morell's photographs remind us that photography is more about how
we see than the tools we use to create it. As we become ensconced with computer
technology, more and more artists are returning to the past, working with
processes and instruments more than one hundred years old. Morell is one of
those artists who burst onto the scene with a series of images made with a
camera obscura -- a lensless camera most often associated with Renaissance
artists.
Morell takes an ordinary room - his living room, his son's bedroom, a hotel
room -- and transforms it into a camera by placing black plastic over all
of the windows, leaving a 3/8" hole through which the light passes. He then
sets up his view camera in the room, points it at the opposite wall, opens
the lens and lets the image appear on the film over the next eight hours.
The result of his endeavor is a magical world which fuses outdoor elements
with domestic scenes, allowing the viewer to see the existing reality outside
the window. Morell has transformed many rooms into cameras, recording the
Empire State Building inside a bedroom, Times Square onto the sterile walls
of a Marriott hotel room, and a view of Brookline onto the walls and ceiling
of his son's bedroom, as trees and buildings interact with toy dinosaurs.
These are extraordinary images alter our perception of reality and our placement
in it.
Along with the camera obscura, Morell has a large body of work on household
objects, photographing them as if seen through the eyes of his son, Brady.
A pair of the artists eyeglasses, a water faucet, a paper bag and a wine glass
are all seen close-up, printed large. The resulting photographs convey the
shocking wide-eyed experience children feel with the adult world.
Morell also photographs pages of antique books, transforming small details
into dynamic structures. Working with extreme close-ups and angles, Morell
chooses unexpected fragments, casting new importance on the nuances within
an illustration. Whether photographing a book, an object or the outside world
projected on his son's wall, all of Morell's images challenge our perception
of reality and how we see.
