Alison Rossiter Photographs Exhibition - Stephen Bulger Gallery

The Stephen Bulger Gallery, in Toronto, announce "Lament", an exhibition of new work by Alison Rossiter that pays homage to the disappearing materials of analogue photography.

In the project, "Lament", Alison Rossiter creates photographic objects that rely on the intrinsic qualities of expired papers. She collects expired photo papers from throughout the 20th Century and processes them to reveal the years of extemporaneous exposure, moisture, humidity, and physical disruptions that have created latent imagery. The remarkable images she produces are silver abstractions and illusions, which come from coaxing these silver gelatin papers to completion.

The artist writes "Five years ago, I thought that I could no longer buy sheet film for a 5 x 7 camera. Fortunately, I was mistaken, but my momentary panic prompted a massive search for discontinued gelatin silver materials. Photography, as I know it, is disappearing." This project would have been unimaginable just some two decades ago when graded gelatin silver papers of every variety were still widely available and the norm. Considering the digital advances in photography, the work speaks to the materials of the medium and makes one aware of the subtlety and variety of photographic surfaces that are now a part of our history.

Alison Rossiter has been making photographs since 1970, and in the past decade has focused her work on the elemental components of the photographic process. Exploring the inherent characteristics of the medium, she works in the darkroom to create photograms of books, light drawings of horses and formal contact prints of sheet film.

Alison Rossiter's photographs can be found in the collections of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Pennsylvania; the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa; the Minneapolis Institute of Art, Minneapolis; the Vancouver Art Gallery, Vancouver; the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; the Museum of Contemporary Photography, Chicago; the Centre for Creative Photography, Tucson; the Getty Museum, Los Angeles, California; the Edmonton Art Gallery, Edmonton; the Winnipeg Art gallery, Winnipeg; the Canadian Museum of Contemporary Photography, Ottawa; the Canada Council Art Bank, Ottawa, among many others.

Stephen Bulger Gallery - April 25 - May 23, 2009, Tuesday to Saturday 11am - 6pm - 1026 Queen Street West - Toronto ON - M6J 1H6 - Canada - http://www.bulgergallery.com/

The Death of Photography - Stephen Bulger Gallery Exhibition

Robert Burley, Michel Campeau, Alison Rossiter - A Stephen Gallery Exhibition "from today, painting is dead!" Paul Delaroche, June, 1839. When the invention of photography was announced to the public on January 7, 1839 it created a sensation for both its advocates and adversaries. At present, photography is arguably more popular than ever, but it is also at the end of an era. Digital systems are rapidly making analog materials obsolete. This exhibition includes the work of three artists who are each commemorating this milestone event in the history of art and technology.

Robert Burley - The goal of this project, "Disappearance of Darkness", is to create a photographic record of a rapidly disappearing manufacturing infrastructure dedicated to the production and use of photochemical materials. The images presented here document the final year of the Kodak Canada facility in Toronto. This facility, which was made up of 18 buildings on a 5 hectare site, had a one hundred year history of producing photographic films and papers. It was sold in 2006 and demolished in the summer of 2007.

Michel Campeau - With this work, "Darkroom", Campeau articulates the decline of photography by concentrating on the obsolescence of private darkrooms. His investigation is like that of an accident expert, one who scrutinizes the incongruity of darkrooms and throws the spotlight on the bric-à-brac of plumbing and electricity, the ventilation-system engines, the posted iconography, the splattering of silver salts, the wear of equipment and the countdown of timers that seem to defy the disappearance of the panchromatic spectre. Campeau's project is the first to be selected for a monograph by Martin Parr, the artistic director of a new series of books published by Nazraeli Press.

Alison Rossiter - In this work "Lament", Rossiter has been creating photographic objects that rely on the intrinsic qualities of old papers and films. She has been buying expired photo papers from throughout the 20th Century and processing them without any additional exposure, in search of light fog or dark fading. She has also been collecting expired sheet film of different makes and sizes to make photograms. The remarkable photographs she produces are silver abstractions of minimal imagery and are the result of light leaks, age, and circumstantial damage.

Stephen Bulger Gallery - January 5 – February 2, 2008 - Opening reception on Saturday, January 12, from 2 – 5 PM. 1026 Queen Street West - Toronto ON - M6J 1H6 - Canada - http://www.bulgergallery.com/