Tenesh Webber - Statement

Through structural and chemical processes, my work explores photography, drawing, and sculpture, and where the three intersect. My aim is to create an abstract image, which questions how a photographic print might be viewed: as a photograph, a photogram or a drawing. I am interested in playing with perceptions of negative and positive space, movement or stasis in an image, and light as a trace of movement and space.

For many years, my work involved the photography of objects, and forms, which I created in the studio. The process involved developing ideas from sketches and models, and making the objects out of paper, plastics, and found objects. Ink drawing and marks were often added to the surface of the objects. I photographed the forms while they are falling, or in motion, utilizing various shutter speeds, and negative layering techniques. At other times the objects were photographed without movement, floating on a black ground.

I am currently working on photograms, in which the sculptural objects lie directly on the paper. The objects are created by hand-cutting shapes, stretching thread, and manipulating found objects. Chance plays a role in the creation of the photograms, as the objects are laid by hand for each print in the edition: often an area of the print will solarize, or there may be slight movement of the objects during the exposure process. All of these chance events are an integral part of the work.

In the process of creating the images, I make small work drawings; I also develop and rework the sculptural objects over a period of time. My work does not necessarily reveal this process; the work is image based rather than process based. The work has many influences linking diverse art movements and periods of art history. These range from Laszlo-Moholy Nagy’s work with simple overlapping shapes in his photograms, to the minimalist sculptor Barry Le Va’s scatter pieces, to contemporary sculptors, Ava Gerber’s and Polly Apfelbaum’s, use of delicate everyday materials.

My abstract photographs and photograms have the texture and tonal range of a charcoal drawing, the basic photographic qualities of light and dark, and are perspectivally flat.