Arcadia
by Vince Aletti
Working primarily with the gallery’s own stable of photographers (and one painter), Clamp explores the idea of a pastoral paradise. If Eden has always been illusory, artist have never tired of imagining it, some with idealized views of the natural landscape (see Frank Yamrus, Marc Yankus, and Aziz+Cucher), others with a sly wink and a lot of artifice. Lori Nix’s waterfall and secluded mountain lake were fabricated in her studio, and James Bidgood’s seductive Pan, who pipes visitors in the entrance, perches in a forest of papier-maché and paint. Stephen Wiles’s pristine rural baseball diamond only looks fake; the actual site of the film “Field of Dreams,” its perfection has been preserved for tourist.
July 2009