Renowned American photographer and filmmaker Larry Clark presents ‘What Do You Do For Fun?’ – A presentation of new collages and archive prints from his notoriously controversial back catalogue of monochromatic images. Often branded as exceeding the ‘shock factor’ barometer, the exhibition will be hosted at the Simon Lee gallery in London this month, following on from a major retrospective of his work at the Musée d’Art Moderne in Paris.
Widely regarded and hyped up by media pomp as being the enfant terrible and guardian of American photography’s suburban underworld, Clark’s images offer unapologetic portraits of dysfunctional teenagers in various scenes of vulnerability, self-destruction and intimate sexuality. Having been enveloped in the drug cultures of suburban life growing up in Tulsa in the 60s, Clark began documenting and creating narrative photography of his marginalised coterie shooting amphetamines and taking part in salacious acts. But despite his one man mission to uncover the seedy depths of suburban life, his method of documentary is not unique, being bandied together with a multifarious group of rebellious photographers including Nan Goldin, Dash Snow, Terry Richardson and the recent entry, Sandy Kim.
However, his preoccupation with these contentious issues is apparently not purely for aesthetic scandal, but a means in which deeper themes can be explored. Clark follows the trajectories of his peers in stark, black and white snap shots that address and question the importance of family relationships, the abolishment of social convention and the formation of identity in adolescence. Although some may point a critical finger at Clark’s seemingly shallow and one dimensional representations of teenage angst, his photography shatters the long-held belief that hard-core drug taking and violence solely exist within the realms of the city landscape. Clark has been quoted as saying that his photographs stem from a ‘psychological need to create’ – which becomes brutally apparent the more one considers the autobiographic context in which the images are created.
Larry Clark “What do you do for fun?”
10th February 2011 – 2nd April 2011
Simon Lee Gallery, 12 Berkeley Street London W1J 8DT U.K.
www.simonleegallery.com
Text by Felicity Shaw
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