Neal Rantoul
Collections: Anatomical Specimens from the 19th Century
January 20 - March 18, 2011
The Griffin Museum at Digital Silver Imaging
11 Brighton St
Belmont, MA
Opening - January 20th 6-8 pm
Gallery talk - February 3rd 7pm
Photographer Neal Rantoul is getting ready for a new exhibition, one that might cause you to question what you are looking at. While we are use to Rantoul pointing his large format camera at landscapes and architecture, he throws us for a loop when he focuses on specimens found at the Civic Museum in Reggio Emilia, Italy and at the Mutter Museum in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
If you walked through either of these museums staring at the subjects found in Rantoul's exhibition, Collections: Anatomical Specimens from the 19th Century, a feeling of grotesque and horror might emerge, however these are not the feelings that erupt when looking at Rantoul's beautifully rendered black and white images of these medical oddities. Despite the dramatic change of subject matter, Rantoul uses his thoughtfulness and sensitivity to form compositions based on light and shape.
Rantoul takes a subject that is hard to look at, so much so that we would rather put it in a dark basement than have it out in the open, and exposes not only its hidden beauty but also an acceptance that these medical phenomena exist and are a part of our history.
Join us at the opening on Thursday January 20, 2011 6-8pm and at the gallery talk with Neal Rantoul on Thursday February 3, 2011 7pm
