RESPLENDENCE (Resplendissement), 2012- 2023, film photography. The images invite the viewer into meditative contemplation on the relationships between place and motivation. Amongst the etheric, material, and afferent impressions the landforms invite transcending into realms within. The dramatic landscapes convey a reverent sense of quiet tension between magnanimous notions of nature and the role of individual human lives. The existentialist vision of nuance weaves emotion and cognition through the performative apparatus of photography. Focusing congruent fields and reflexively impressing their forms through sight into the human body, the exposures lend themselves to questions on life, particularly the roles time and light have in generating Place. Questions of subjectivity looks into the formation of latent images. Rarely, if ever, a 1:1 relation, the memories and codes within the viewer are woven with the perceptions of Resplendence. Where and how does the land out-there form the inner landscapes to dominate or acquiesce? Considering layers of densities in perception, the images paid sensitivity to ways those spaces and forms are accessible or subliminally shielded, psychologically coded, and culturally deemed real and verifiable. While the north shore of Chicago, California, and primarily Norway, including Østlandet, Trøndelag, and Nordland are represented, instead of actual geographic locations, Resplendence focuses on contributing to opening up and inviting viewers into the field of imagination in a time where such places may seem forbidden.
L’Œil de la Photographie featured the Albumen Gallery exhibition, March 2023. L’exposition des photographies de Rachel Wolfe de paysage récents sert d’antidote parfaite aux turbulences et aux difficultés vécues dans de nombreuses régions du monde. La dignité humaine ne doit pas être savourée à petites doses pour échapper à la violence de la guerre, aux troubles sociaux ou simplement survivre à la crise du coût de la vie. Un sentiment de calme spirituel imprègne les photos de la photographe nord/américaine. La vaste étendue et le drame des paysages transmettent simultanément le sentiment de l’insignifiance de l’existence humaine individuelle et l’expérience de transcender les contraintes de la vie quotidienne mondaine.
Rachel Wolfe’s exhibition of her recent landscape photography serves as a perfect antidote to the turbulence and hardship experienced in many parts of the world. Human dignity does not have to be savoured in small doses escaping the violence of war, social unrest or just surviving the cost of living crisis. A sense of spiritual calmness permeates the photos of the Nordic/American photographer. The vast expanse and drama of the landscapes simultaneously convey a sense of insignificance of individual human existence and the experience of transcending the constraints of mundane day-to-day life. – Stephan Schmid, Albumen Gallery, . A book dummy was made alongside Albumen Gallery exhibition. The spreads are designed to flow, creating a sense of subtle movement within the reader. Saal Digital printed the first book with an acrylic cover and leather binding.
Resplendence Cover
Further background: Remembering invites pause to consider where beliefs around the way nature is or works, can reveal a logic proported as one thing, performing as an entirely different function. The foundational motives in authoritarian psyches are based more in vision of nature instead of nature itself. The nature has often been coopted as an alibi for human behavior, and continues to be our field of dreams, projections, martyr, savior, triangulated reason for accepting or rejecting social narratives. As one of several examples, follied beliefs drove forced labor at Vemork Kraftverk during WWII. Workers resisted orders and broke small parts of the heavy water production. Due to resistance, the advancement of nuclear technology was thwarted under the hate and dominating motivations of the reich. Later on, heavy water is not needed to procure nuclear chain reactions to generate energy. The heavy water manufactured under Hitler’s regime was sunk to the bottom of the nearby body of water in Vemork. Insofar as we know about the states of water, there are several forms producing subtle variations in our ability to perceive through sense and what makes sense. And in that sense, of the way things go, resistance aligns with an ode to the season often most feared or misunderstood. All that falls becomes transmuted through the earth under the weight of Winter. The Resplendence series was formerly several different collections Vereri, Heavy Water, and Landscape Psychologies. Throughout the evolution of the project created through intuitive and existential processes, was later found to have congruent motivations. Vereri, to have respect for, can also be found out through conflict, such as in the etymological roots of wær, or war. In a prayer for truth, may all that is revealed in these images living with and through them today, be proof the truth is remembered and found in love. The series is represented by Albumen Gallery.
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
-Rachel Wolfe, March 2023, Paris, France
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |