February 17 – March 26, 2005
Opening reception:
Thursday, February 17th, 2005
6:00 to 8:00 p.m.
ClampArt is pleased to announce “Death Valley,” an exhibition of photographs by Robert Vizzini. This is the inaugural show in the gallery’s Project Room.
Robert Vizzini, who has built a reputation for his nighttime studies, now has ventured into the unsparing sunlight of Death Valley. Two hundred eighty-two feet below sea level, Death Valley is one of the hottest and driest places on earth. Vizzini’s photographs depict the undulating dunes and wide, graceful curves carved in the sand of this desolate, stark landscape. The photographs feature such sites as Zabriskie Point, Devil’s View, and the Stovepipe Wells Sand Dunes, among other locales in Death Valley National Park.
“There is a melancholic desert beauty I tried to capture,” says Vizzini. The sweeping photographic vantage points, with no living thing in sight, accentuate the isolation of this remote area, as if the artist found himself alone in this prehistoric landscape. This is no mean feat in a national park visited by hundreds of thousands of tourists every year.
Faced with the threat of drastically shifting weather patterns, adjoining areas of Death Valley were devastated by flash floods in 2004—reason enough to preserve and document the evolving environment before it is no longer ours to enjoy.
The artworks to be included in the exhibition are meticulous, handcrafted lith prints, Vizzini’s hallmark style. Rather than using traditional photographic chemicals, the artist employs a lithographic developer, which results in delicate, warm tones that compliment the light and shadow of the desert’s passing morning light.
Robert Vizzini was the first recipient of the prestigious New Discovery Award of the International Photography Awards in 2003. His photographs have been exhibited internationally and widely collected. Vizzini’s work is represented in the collections of the Bibliotèque nationale de France, Paris; Southeast Museum of Photography, Daytona Beach, Florida; AXA Financial, New York City; Goldman Sachs & Company, New York City; Swiss Re Capital Partners, Zurich; among many others.