Scott Nichols Gallery is proud to announce our latest exhibition of photographs by Mona Kuhn showcasing a selection of works from her captivating new book, Evidence (Steidl, 2007). This exhibition is the fourth solo show from Scott Nichols, Kuhn’s original gallery, which first exhibited her black and white work in 1997.
In her latest body of work, Kuhn raises the question of lost paradises and less than innocent youth. Although her models are nude, there is an underlying assertion of clothing, they are always protected by their own skin. "Kuhn's matter of fact approach to the human body is not unlike that of Larry Sultan in his San Fernando Valley photographs, although these results are more wholesome because of the absence of sexual overtones" writes curator Gordon Baldwin. "Muted sexual undercurrents are perhaps inevitable in gatherings of unclothed men and women of this age."
Internationally recognized for her alluring renderings of the human form, Kuhn's subjects are suggestive but ultimately ambiguous. Kuhn weaves together the traditional iconography of nude studies with tenuously held planes of focus that lure the eye and provoke the imagination, creating a visual patois at once classical and contemporary.
Mona Kuhn was born in Sao Paulo, Brazil, in 1969, of German descent. She earned her degrees in The United States from both Ohio State University and the San Francisco Art Institute. Since 1998, she has been an independent studies scholar at the Getty Research Institute in Los Angeles. She was a nominee for the 2006 Prix Photographique BMW-ParisPhoto Award. Her work has been shown internationally, as well as in the United States. These photographs were shot entirely in France, where she resides each summer. Currently, Mona Kuhn lives and works in Los Angeles. |
