October 27 – December 17, 2005
Artist’s reception:
Thursday, October 27th
6:00 to 8:00 p.m.
ClampArt is pleased to announce Most Muscular, an exhibition of new photographs by artist, Brian Finke.
Since the completion of his last series depicting high school cheerleaders and football players (which was shown at ClampArt in the fall of 2003), Brian Finke has been traveling across the country photographing male and female bodybuilders at both professional and amateur competitions. As with his earlier work, the artist transforms what might be a standard photojournalistic project into something much more complex and wholly unique. Expert attention to color and composition is set-off by Finke’s signature lighting, lending these images an immediate and unmistakable power. However, their ultimate strength again derives from the artist’s lighthearted humor which breathes life into the photographs.
In many ways, Most Muscular is a direct continuation of Finke’s earlier interest in and exploration of athleticism—the pageantry and ritual, in addition to the artifice and irony of diversity within uniformity. At its most fundamental, this project comments upon our society’s obvious obsession with the body and appearances. Finke’s subjects have taken cultural standards of beauty to heart, and then pushed them beyond all comprehensible limits. Yet, without judgment or reproof, Finke opens our eyes to the inanity of our own obsessions.
Brian Finke graduated from the School of Visual Arts in New York City in 1998 with a BFA in photography. Since that time, he has had incredible success as an artist, with work placed in six museum collections here and abroad. His first monograph, “2-4-6-8: American Cheerleaders and Football Players,” was named one of the best photography books of 2004 by American Photo magazine. Also in 2004, Finke was one of twelve artists nominated for the International Center for Photography’s annual Infinity Award, and he won a prestigious New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship.