ABSTRACT

The images presented to me were photographs, ostensibly so at least, for

they were veiled behind a protective sheet of translucent paper that rendered

them feint and misty, making it diffi cult to discern anything but distant and

undemarcated landscapes, expansive and harsh to the horizon. Intrigue was

added in that they were proffered under the rubric of ‘architecture’, seemingly

doubly displaced in this context. In lifting the protective cellulose sheet the

images were revealed ‘naked’, but they in no way resolved themselves. Photo-

graphs they certainly were, predominantly landscapes, sometimes structures,

and with buildings, or fragments of buildings, included within their frame

(sometimes spilling out of it). But such fragments, despite their elegant and

beguiling composition, slyly subverted their own status, revealing themselves

as ‘impossible’ combinations, contradictory scales and styles juxtaposed in

anomalous landscapes. Such undecidability of classifi cation compelled further

scrutiny, which in turn led to further subversion of the scene presented, such

that one experienced a curious and vertiginous feeling of unease which con-

tradicted the aesthetic poise and calm of the imagery.