#ben buswell

[yama-bato]

Ben Buswell (b. 1974 in Dallas, Oregon)

The Sound Arrives Before the Impact, 2018

[60inchcenter]

Ben Buswell @ Upfor

Josephine Zarkovich

I Do Not Belong to the Sky (Horizon), 2015 embellished Lambda photographs, dimensions variable via

In the exhibition No One Above or Below, Ben Buswell uses photographic materials to create wall mounted sculptures, pushing the structure to the point of breaking. I Do Not Belong to the Sky (Horizon), horseshoes around one corner of the gallery, the photo paper twisted and lacerated like the metal of an automobile crash. Horizon No. 7 is literally shredded, the strips of the photo paper hanging like fringe down the center of the frame. In a series of water landscapes Buswell has reworked the surface of the images, creating an undulating texture, but even under this pretty effect there is a hint of violence, the instrument used has pulled up the actual print in places, leaving behind tiny white voids in the image.

Horizon No. 7, 2014 embellished Lambda prints and frame, 32 x 31 x 4 inches (frame 21 x 31 x 2 inches) via

Buswell was one of the artists represented by Upfor Gallery at the Paris Photo Los Angeles this month. But if this work is photography, it's photography deconstructed, the seams wrenched open and exposed. It brings to mind Susan Sontag, who once grumpily cautioned:

"Despite the presumption of veracity that gives all photographs authority, interest, seductiveness, the work that photographers do is no generic exception to the usually shady commerce between art and truth." 

 In the case of Buswell’s works, that authority of the photographic lens is disrupted. The artist's hand is ever present, the manipulation so tactile it cannot be ignored. As an audience member, I am reminded again and again of the physical “thingness” of them, of both their fragility and endurance under stress. While still unmistakably using the materials of photography, they do less to capture a moment in time and instead record the passage of time on the print itself.

The Same River (Celilo) (polyptych, detail), 2015 embellished Lambda prints and frames, each 18 x 12 x 4 inches via

The closing reception for No One Above or Below is tonight, Thursday May 7 at Upfor gallery and the Artist will being giving a talk on Saturday May 9th at 11AM. http://www.upforgallery.com/buswell-no-one-above-or-below

 For more information about Ben Buswell you can visit his website here: http://www.benbuswell.com