testimony of simplicity
jason kalogiros
unosolo is pleased to announce Testimony of Simplicity the first solo exhibition in Europe of California-based artist Jason Kalogiros. The exhibition will feature a number of photographic works that utilize doubling and repetition as both a mode of production as well as a metaphorical grounding point. To produce these images, Kalogiros used a double pinhole camera fashioned from a Quaker Oats oatmeal container. Holes poked through the eyes of the iconic portrait that appears on the front of the container have become twin apertures, yielding a double image.
The name “Quaker Oats,” in conjunction with the smiling image long associated with this product, is meant to suggest the ideals of integrity, honesty and purity often associated with the Religious Society of Friends– or Quakers, as they are also known. The Quaker Testimony of Simplicity states that one’s life should be lived as simply as possible, in order to focus on what is most important. Kalogiros’ appropriation of the name of this doctrine suggests that he is using it as a guiding principle for his work.
Kalogiros has commented that this body of work came about as a result of trying to figure out if it was still possible to make a sincere image of an over-represented and seemingly exhausted subject: a sunset. It occurred to him that using pinhole photography—an approach he had learned many years before, as a beginning student– might enable him to see and portray this clichéd subject anew. Kalogiros’ double aperture yields an image that transforms its clichéd subject. As he has noted: ‘While a sunset represents an ending, a double sunset suggests a metaphor of an alternate story, of the hope and possibility of multiple endings.’
For any further information please contact:
gallery@unosunove.com