Stan Douglas: Midcentury Studio
Edited by Tommy Simoens. Texts by Stan Douglas, Christopher Phillips, and Pablo Sigg
Published on the occasion of his tenth solo exhibition at David Zwirner in 2011, this richly illustrated catalogue debuts an extensive project by Stan Douglas that chronicles the burgeoning discipline of press photography in North America during the postwar period. Douglas has assumed the role of a fictional, anonymous photographer to create a series of images hypothetically produced between 1945-1951. To do so, he constructed a veritable “midcentury studio” using authentic equipment as well as actors to produce carefully staged, black-and-white photographs that painstakingly emulate the period’s obsession with drama, “caught-in-the-moment” crime-scenes, curious and exotic artifacts, magicians, fashion, dance, gambling, and technology. Midcentury Studio features an introduction by the artist and essays by curator Christopher Phillips and writer Pablo Sigg.
Publisher: Ludion
Artists: Stan Douglas
Contributors: Stan Douglas, Christopher Phillips, Pablo Sigg, Tommy Simoens
Publication Date: 2011
Binding: Hardcover
Dimensions: 8 3/4 x 10 1/4 in (22.2 x 26 cm)
Pages: 116
Reproductions: 13 b&w, 46 duotone
ISBN: 9789055448791
Retail: $40 US & Canada
Status: Out Of Print
Stan Douglas
Since the late 1980s, Stan Douglas has created films, photographs, and installations that reexamine particular locations or past events. His works often take their points of departure in local settings, from which broader issues can be identified. Making frequent use of new as well as outdated technologies, Douglas appropriates existing Hollywood genres (including murder mysteries and the Western) and borrows from classic literary works (notably, Samuel Beckett, Herman Melville, and Franz Kafka) to create ready-made contextual frameworks for his complex, thoroughly researched projects.