DAVILLE BAILLIE GALLERY
PRESENTS
WHITE
A SOLO EXHIBITION BY BENJAMIN SKINNER
Victoria Yards, Lorentzville
11 November 2017 – 2 December 2017
Exhibition opening Saturday 11 November at 11am
The Daville Baillie Gallery takes great pleasure in opening its new space at the development of Victoria Yards, in Lorentzville Johannesburg, with the exhibition WHITE by Benjamin Skinner.
The move to a bigger premises in this refurbished set of industrial workshops, on the outskirts of Joburg city, signifies a bold stride forward in exhibiting the finest emergent and established talent in South Africa. This includes the photography of Benjamin Skinner whose oeuvre takes into account the interior, private world of unnamed individuals.
Skinner and his subjects have shared in intimate and fleeting moments, in a way that is seldom seen on mainstream gallery walls. We are taken to a privileged space in which changing time is described through a tension between stillness and movement, as well as ordinariness and exception.
The title of the exhibition itself denotes an activity occurring in interstices where light has allowed us to witness something we may have assumed would take place in the dark.
It is this ‘lightness’ that transports us to a fundamental site of human experience.
Biography: Benjamin Skinner
Benjamin Skinner grew up in the Eastern Highlands of Zimbabwe. At the age of ten he got his first camera and began by taking photographs of plants and bugs. In his teenage years, he relocated to Victoria Falls and focused on environmental portraiture and wildlife. He felt his photographic skills were limited and so moved to South Africa where he studied photography formally in Pretoria.
Skinner then moved to the Middle East where he took up a commercial career in photography. He pursued news stories as a photojournalist, and also took pictures for fashion and advertising. After his return to South Africa, and a brief foray into agriculture, he decided to commit his talents to photography as art.
He has a fascination with combining the opulent and the grotesque. He contrasts the refined with the depraved. Nude figures, rough textures, fine details, dirty light, and layered expression, characterize his images. He often uses elaborately built sets and numerous models. His skills in construction, clothing design and production, allow him to involve himself throughout the production of the images which he often prints large, in excess of three meters.
Skinner has shown his work at Scope Miami Beach (2016), Scope New York (2016), the Johannesburg Art Fair (2015), Art Brussels (2015), and at Turbine Hall (2013 and 2014). He has held solo exhibition at Res Gallery (2014), where he built the exhibition space. He currently has work with Galerie Galéa, France and most recently appeared in the prestigious Snoecks catalogue (2017).
For more information: www.benskinnerphotography.com
The Daville Baillie Gallery is pleased to announce its relocation from Norwood to the new development of Victoria Yards in Lorentzville.
The new Daville Baillie Gallery at Victoria Yards will occupy approximately 400 sq metres, in a double volume warehouse space in the prime centre court of the Victoria Yards.
The design concept, by Thomas Wilton Interior Design, adheres to the aesthetic of the building leaving many of the original features untouched. The main entrance reveals floating offices and a mezzanine, with walkways separating different spaces that can adapt, for the purposes of exhibition and special functions.
Designer Thomas Wilton heads up Thomas W Interior Design (www.thomaswinterioris.co.za), a Johannesburg based company that has functioning designs in all centres. The company is known for national collaborations with high profile retailers.
For more information:
Matthew Krouse
+27 82 498 8734
artinfo.za@gmail.com
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