JACK SPENCER
THIS LAND

Exhibition Dates: November 25, 2005 - January 15, 2006
Reception for the Artist: Friday, Nov. 25, 2005 - 5-7 p.m.

The Andrew Smith Gallery presents an exhibit of new photographs by Jack Spencer titled This Land, opening Friday, November 25, 2005 with a reception for the artist from 5-7 p.m. Born in Mississippi and raised in Louisiana, Spencer achieved notoriety for his photographs of people and landscapes of the Mississippi River Delta that appeared in his first book, Native Soil (1999). He spent the next three years in Mexico working on "Apariciones," a series filled with magical realism. For the last several years he has been taking landscape photographs throughout the United States for a series called "This Land."

A prolific photographer, Spencer produces around fifty new images a year. In 2003, 2004 and 2005 he traveled through various parts of the United States, Canada and Nova Scotia to attend openings of his work. On each trip he avoided interstate highways and he did his best to get lost on back country roads. Some trips lasted as long as two months and covered 9000 miles giving him ample time to photograph towns and country with a digital Canon 1Ds Mark II camera and a 4x5 film camera.

Images in the exhibit at Andrew Smith Gallery range from cloud swathed Grand Tetons, to a grass fire burning an Idaho prairie, to a palmetto forest in Florida. While human occupation is suggested in many images, virtually none of these works show people. Spencer carefully composes his images, presenting each scene in a simple straightforward manner. And yet these photographs appeal primarily to the emotions, evoking many associations and feelings in viewers. For Spencer the artistic process is both a literal journey to actual places, and a journey through realms of imagination and uncanny beauty. The book, This Land will be published in 2006 by University of Texas Press.  The exhibit continues through January 15, 2006.

Spencer's umber hued and selectively colored prints glisten with a soft tactility seldom seen in photography that is achieved through unique technical processes devised by the artist. The slightly out-of-focus quality comes from selectively controlling the focus of the camera. It is also produced in the darkroom by projecting negatives in the enlarger through various transparent materials that distort light before it reaches the photographic paper. Each photograph is coated with up to three coats of oil varnish medium. Some prints are distressed with coats of asphaltum that is applied and removed. Other prints are slightly torn and dented. Thus, each image has a patina suggesting age, history, and even a sense of "long suffering." Each photographic print is a unique object, although not dramatically so. Spencer prints his images in three sizes in limited editions of 20 for the medium sizes, and a limited edition of 5 for the largest size.

"Road and Fog, Montana, 2005"
The umber and gray-hued photograph, "Road and Fog, Montana, 2005, " is a haunting, timeless scene that might have been taken yesterday or one hundred years old. A fence line runs through rolling hills covered with tawny grasses and shrubs, pulling our gaze and our wanderlust down a rain soaked dirt road that disappears in the fog.



"Night Window Livingston, Montana 2005"
A master story teller Spencer tends to place dominant subjects and objects, like the main characters of a short story, near the center of the picture. In "Night Window Livingston, Montana 2005" a hotel window at night is illuminated by an old fashioned lamp centered between lace curtains. An old fashioned radiator and a deer head on the walls ornament the interior of the silent lobby. The scene could have come out of a novel by William Faulkner, Cormac McCarthy, or Flannery O'Connor. Printed in subdued sepia and brown-red tones, the only tiny spot of color is a minute reflection on the window of a neon "vacancy" sign.

"Alabama Town Front, Alabama, 2004"
This photograph of a storefront recalls Walker Evans' honest depictions of vernacular architecture. But in Spencer's photograph time has passed and the store is now a relic. Its windows are boarded up and the wood slats on the roof are peeling. Only the signs "Moseley General Store" and "Coca-Cola" have survived intact.

"Monument Valley, Utah, 2003"
In this stunning landscape Spencer makes us feel as if we are seeing for the first time the primordial beauty of buttes in Monument Valley. Using soft-focus techniques he creates the impression that we are looking through an old camera lens that blurs and distorts. Dark pools of tone on the corners of the frame mingle with unpredictable light streaks, imperfections that only add to the rich tones and textures of the print.

"Horses #15 Badlands, South Dakota 2003"
A horse herd seen from a great distance canters over seemingly endless grasslands. Spencer managed to keep the horses in sharp focus while eliminating all detail in the grasses and horizon so that foreground and background blur together. The photograph conveys a feeling of boundless energy and freedom.

"Jefferson Memorial Washington DC 2005"
Spencer softened the tones of this photograph into masses of light and dark. Appearing in the distance, as if seen through a keyhole, is the Greek ideal of architectural perfection. The famous Jefferson Memorial perched on a hill overlooking a lake looks dreamlike, evanescent and airy.

"Palmettos St. Mary's, Georgia 2005"
Spencer photographed a forest of spiky palmetto plants, pine trees and oaks. Each fan shaped leaf is described with a wide range of light and dark tones. Exotic and remote in feeling, the composition recalls one of Henri Rousseau's fantastic jungle paintings.

Last summer Spencer became intrigued with the peonies, magnolias, and roses blooming around his house. He set about to make a few photographs, but quickly became absorbed in the project. One photograph led to another and over the course of four months he created twenty floral photographs. A selection of this work is also part of the exhibit "This Land."

Jack Spencer lives in Nashville, Tennessee. His photographs are in major museum and corporate collections throughout the United States and abroad, and have been published in Photo Metro, Oxford American, and American Way magazines. This year he won the Lucie Award for "Nature Photographer of the Year." His current project has been photographing young men displaced from the Sudan who now live in Nashville. Spencer has created a foundation to help them and is working on a book of photographs to benefit the foundation called "Lost Boys of Sudan."

Liz Kay


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