Tal Shochat at Andrea Meislin

Back on the first weekend of the new gallery season, I stopped in the Andrea Mesilin Gallery to see Israeli photographer Tal Shochat's show "Awakening". The photographs are strikingly different from the typical show that catches my eye in that they are varied in the size, format, subject, etc. to make a larger whole. The art is created by collecting the prints together to make up a larger concept. Many contemporary photography shows are instead made of a series of similar prints, similar in subject, style or theme. This fact was unknown to me when I added her to my visit list and I had become interested based on two small Web site thumbnails of other-worldly set-piece trees. Along side those, the other images are hard to describe. Some are highly polished brick walls of various colors and indeterminable size. Others are weathered branches set in geometrical patterns. And still others contained images of women lying on their sides, back to the viewer and meshed in someways with the backgrounds. What all this was saying, well, read the press release. What struck me most was that the message, the art, was bound up win the collection of images as a whole, but was being sold piece by piece - as market realities dictate.

The gallery owner, Andrea Meislin, was there during my visit and was great about leaping in to answer questions. This was probably the first time I've had a person attached to a gallery stop to answer questions that weren't addressed directly to them. My wife had asked me about the presentation of the photos - mounted under plexiglass. I shrugged. Meiselin spoke right up to give a short explanation of the process.

Through Oct. 22nd at Andrea Meislin Gallery
526 W 26th St, Suite 214
(212) 627-2552