Indelible Image, 2009

Tokyo Wonder Site - Shibuya Gallery

The paintings of "Indelible Image" are a composite of two layers of visual information that become subtly animated when viewed. The ground is an oil painting of the source image and just centimeters in front of this, above this surface, is the actual photographic image printed on transparent silk. The viewer looks through the silk screen onto the painted surface. The formal layering of the work culminates in a painting that mediates between the document, the event, the viewer and the interpretive possibilities that surround them.  What has been closed, filed in an archive, is now open, animated by the viewer who ultimately shifts the relationships between the depths and the surfaces of the work.

In this exhibition, McCallum & Tarry were interested in seeing how the images of the civil rights movement, that are an essential part of their cultural DNA, were presented in Japan. This point of departure, in turn, lead to the artists' discovery of the pivotal importance that 1968 had for Japan - as it did for so many other countries around the world.

Ascension: April 27, 1968 (The Yomiuri Shimbun Collection, National Diet Library) A New Departure, 1968 (After unknown photographer; The Japan Times, National Diet Library Collection) Memory Remnant, 1968 (After unknown photographer; The Japan Times, National Diet Library Collection) Triptych Remnant, 1968 (After unknown photographer; The Japan Times, National Diet Library Collection) Hairdresser,1968 (After unknown photographer; The Japan Times, National Diet Library Collection) Idealistic Flame, 1968 (After unknown photographer; The Japan Times, National Diet Library Collection)