Featured Photographer: Diane Meyer - "A Stitch in Time"
“Templehof”, Hand Sewn Archival Ink Jet Print, 2019
© Diane Meyer
During a time when traditional analog photography was the only way to go and the idea of digital imaging was in its infancy, the quality of this new technology was struggling a bit. The problem was that as soon as you enlarged an image on the screen, it almost immediately fell apart in this blocky-looking, jagged mess. A new word was learned by photographers when that happened: bitmap. We found out that digital photographs were built on the same principles of early video games where the characters, landscape, and, well, everything, was made up of bits and blocks. Thus, bitmapped images became the calling card of early cameras and digital photographs. So when I first saw the work of Diane Meyer, I was immediately taken back to this time in a nostalgic way, only now with a renewed interest for how this look could illustrate concepts of time and memory. Meyers photographs are the result of a hybrid of digital, analog, and mixed media processes to create an illusion of something appearing pixelated in parts of the photograph, but this time using embroidery to create the effect. Over time she has developed this process into multiple bodies of work that explore these themes, with one such collection, Berlin, highlighted here.
While always interested in making things as a child, during her high school years, Meyers became more seriously interested in art, driven by a class in art history and darkroom-based photography courses. Then, during her college years, she felt the need to do something more "practical" in her career choice. Still, after changing majors several times, she eventually migrated back to her love of photography. Transferring to the Photography and Imaging program at NYU, where she graduated in 1999, Meyers followed this up by receiving her MFA in Visual Arts from The University of California, San Diego. Today, she is a Professor of Photography at Loyola Marymount University, in Los Angeles, and is represented by Klompching Gallery in Brooklyn.
“Engeldamm”, Hand Sewn Archival Ink Jet Print, 2019
© Diane Meyer
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“Former Guard Tower, Deutsche Waldjugend Nature Conservancy”, Hand Sewn Archival Ink Jet Print, 2019
© Diane Meyer
The creative process of Meyers' photographs begins in a very traditional analog sense, for her, the Mamiya 7 camera and Kodak Portra film. Negatives are then scanned, and archival pigment prints are produced. Her pixelated effects are then made by hand embroidering directly into the print's surface in selected areas. The embroidery resembles pixels directed by an interest in drawing on the visual language of digital imaging in an analog process.
For her Berlin series, Meyers photographed a wide range of locations taken along the roughly 100-mile path of the former Berlin Wall, from the city center to the city's outskirts, following the original route of the Wall through suburbs and forests. In several of the images, the embroidered sections represent the exact scale and location of the former Wall, offering a pixelated view of what lies behind. As Meyers states, "By using the embroidery in a way that is reminiscent of pixels, a connection is being made between forgetting and file corruption."
“Former Guard Tower Off Puschkinallee”, Hand Sewn Archival Ink Jet Print, 2013
© Diane Meyer
From her statement:
"I was particularly interested in photographing locations where no visible traces of the actual wall remain but where one can still see subtle clues of its previous existence. These clues include incongruities in the architecture that occurred as new structures were built on newly opened land parcels, changes in streetlights, or newer vegetation. Often the embroidered sections of the image run along the horizon line forming an unnatural separation that blocks the viewer. This aspect of the sewing emphasizes the unnatural boundaries created by the wall itself. The sewing, which is soft and domestic, provides a literal contrast to the concrete of the wall and a metaphorical contrast to its symbolism. As the scale of the stitches remains the same, the overall size of the image determines the amount of detail captured in the embroidery with the larger pieces in the series having over 30,000 individual stitches."
This marriage of analog, digital, and mixed media processes provides us with yet another example of how the artist's hand can become a hallmark of their work. Diane Meyers has created an aesthetic that brings the viewer back time and time again to reinvestigate her work, as repeated viewings bring about new discoveries while also opening our eyes to the porous nature of memory. We invite you to look beyond this article and review the many collections she has produced with a similar process. You will like what you find.
GALLERY
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Diane Meyer received a BFA in Photography from New York University, Tisch School of the Arts in 1999 and an MFA in Visual Arts from The University of California, San Diego in 2002. She has been living in Los Angeles since 2005.
Her work has been exhibited in solo exhibitions at Klompching Gallery, NYC; the Griffin Museum of Photography, Winchester, MA; the 18th Street Art Center, Santa Monica; AIR Gallery, NYC; and The Society for Contemporary Photography, Kansas City.
Her work has also been shown in numerous group shows in the United States and abroad including at the George Eastman Museum, Rochester; Robert Mann Gallery, NYC; Regina Anzenberger Gallery, Vienna, Austria; Klompching Gallery, NYC; The Brattleboro Museum of Art, VT; Kiscell Museum, Budapest; Kunstagentur Dresden, Germany; Große Rathaus, Landshut, Germany; the Diffusion International Photography Festival, Cardiff, Wales; Arena 1 Gallery, Santa Monica; the Laband Art Gallery, Los Angeles; ABC Treehouse, Amsterdam; Fototropia, Guatemala City; Schneider Gallery, Chicago; Field Projects, NYC; China House, Penang, Malaysia; Galerie Huit, Arles, France; Project 42, Alkmaar, The Netherlands; Große Rathaus Galerie, Landshut; The Clarinda Carnegie Museum, IA; The Center for Photography at Woodstock, NY, Susan Laney Contemporary, Savannah; The Hood Museum, New Hampshire; Dina Mitrani Gallery, Miami; and the Paper Positions Art Fair, Berlin.
Her work is in the permanent collections of the George Eastman Museum, the Clarinda Carnegie Museum, the Hood Museum, the Museum of Contemporary Photography, Chicago and the University of Maryland.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Michael Kirchoff is a photographic artist, independent curator and juror, and advocate for the photographic arts. He has been a juror for Photolucida’s Critical Mass, and has reviewed portfolios for the Los Angeles Center of Photography’s Exposure Reviews, PhotoNOLA, and CENTER’s Review Santa Fe. Michael has been a contributing writer for Lenscratch, Light Leaked, and Don’t Take Pictures magazine. In addition, he spent ten years (2006-2016) on the Board of the American Photographic Artists in Los Angeles (APA/LA), producing artist lectures, as well as business and inspirational events for the community. Currently, he is also Editor-in-Chief at Analog Forever Magazine, Founding Editor for the online photographer interview website, Catalyst: Interviews, and a Contributing Editor for the column, Traverse, at One Twelve Publishing. Previously, Michael spent over four years as Editor at BLUR Magazine.
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