From Thomas Kellner’s blog post:

Becca Rothfeld, a journalist writing for The New Yorker stated: “‘Restraint and Desire’ is a study of intimacy and its impediments: the tender images it contains portray longing (desire) when it is regulated by ritual (restraint). The [work] depicts perfectly ordinary exchanges in familiar, formalized settings. . . Yet each [space] is both an obstacle to and a condition of love’s consummation.”

All of the different human behaviors photographed by Graves and Lipman are often revealing of a certain sexual tension present among the subjects. Lipman and Graves explained that not only is this tension present in the world around them but that it also was a reflection upon their own relationship. As Lipman puts it, “our work reflected back to us, like a mirror, the intensities and power dynamics of our shared life together.”

Read the full article
Browse all work by Ken Graves and Eva Lipman at CLAMP