Carl De Keyzer – Stephan Vanfleteren
Posted on 13. Sep, 2009 by Peter in Photography
Carl De Keyzer – Trinity
Last week was full of photography exhibitions. I went to see Carl De Keyzer’s Trinity exhibitionin the SMAK. It was the last day of the exhibition and I am thrilled to have been able to visit it. It’s a truely amazing composition of breathtaking photos.Especially the Tableaux d’Histoire are some of the best work I’ve seen. If you haven’t seen the exhibition already you can always buy the book.
Stephan Vanfleteren – Portret
A few days before I went to the opening of the new Stephan Vanfleteren exhibition: Portret. I suppose everyone is familiar with the work of Stephan. Contrary to most people I’m not a really big fan of the exhibition. I really like some of the photos but seeing almost hundred of these portraits makes the “Vanfletern-effect” a bit too obvious and too much. Especially these prints often had too much vignette and extreme contrast with sometimes even all-too-obvious darkroom/Lightroom adjustments (dodge/burn with halo etc).Nevertheless the quality of his work is amazing but seeing his most famous portraits all together gave me a Vanfleteren overload. Altough it also made me realize he has some other amazing portraits which are less obvious Vanfleterens (like the one of Friedl Lesage). Photographer Michiel Heyndrickx made a cuisine-analogy. Vanfleteren is like a cook who uses a lot of cream. At first it’s delicious and the greasy food tastes lovely. But after a few dishes you get enough of it and you end up with a digestion.
Of course I didn’t end up with a digestion but I did found it trop.
One thing I really have to mention is the amazing location. The winter circus Mahy in the center of Gent makes the exhibition that bit more special. After Stephan launched the idea it took a lot of (political) pressure from the mayor of Gent, Daniël Termont, and the governor, André Denys, and a fair bit of cleaning to make it happen. The circus is in a terrible state because it’s bewildered after all those years of vacancy so it’s not a usual suspect when it comes to exhibition locations. The least you can say though is it was more than worth the effort. The architecture and atmosphere of the building enhance the large black and white prints.
Make sure you check out Portret yourself and let me know what you think of it.
