La exposición de Kander enseña imágenes de desnudos, pertenecientes a su serie «Bodies», profundizando en el debate sobre el desnudo originado por artistas del Renacimiento, que continuó bien entrado el siglo XX y que ha proporcionado a los artistas durante los años un tema fetiche. Esta serie de desnudos en fotografías pictóricas de gran formato genera, según la organización, «una incómoda tensión entre la intimidad y la objetivación, pues el artista capta de manera memorable a cada modelo en un repertorio de gestos, posturas y movimientos que provocan una perturbadora inquietud».
Inner Condition desafía el concepto actual de la belleza, aportando variedad y plasmando con realismo e intimidad su particular representación del cuerpo humano desnudo. Nadav Kander, un fotógrafo de reconocido éxito, irrumpió en la escena artística en 2009 al ser galardonado con el premio Prix Pictet por documentar a través de imágenes los rápidos cambios sufridos en el paisaje y las comunidades chinas del río Yangtzé, desde su nacimiento hasta su desembocadura. «Esta nueva serie de desnudos lo consolida como un artista contemporáneo y creador de imágenes polifacético y carismático”.
ENG: The world-renowned photographer Nadav Kander, born in Israel in1961 and currently residing in London, explains his latest showing as “Revealed yet concealed. Shameless yet shameful. Ease with unease. Beauty and destruction, these paradoxes are displayed in all my work; an inquiry into what it feels like to be human.” In this exhilaratingly existential show, we see a variety of stripped-down subjects in various unusual poses, each coated in white marble dust and set against a murky black backdrop. Larger than life-sized, they’re startlingly presented as if they were classical statues cherubic, Elizabethan, elegant, grandiose yet understated. The simplicity of his images combined with the complexity of their message is a tool Kander has long continued to perfect, and his remarkable ability to capture the mood of the moment has never before been conveyed so dramatically.
It’s almost photography as theatre, engaging the viewer from the very first glance. You’re initially struck by the fluent fluorescent skin. Larval and trenchant, it’s skilfully contrasted against the insouciant eternal black backdrop. The mysterious positioning of the naked bodies adds to a sense of secrecy, the faces often turned away from the camera. Although they’re fully “revealed”, they appear to be keeping something away from the viewer. All this makes for an intensely interactive and intimate experience between the work and one’s self.
There are echoes of the paintings of St Sebastian (Andrea Mantegna, 1490). The difference being instead of arrows penetrating the helpless victim, the pain is coming from an invisible source the judging eyes of the stranger viewing it. Thoughts, unknowable to them, pierce their soul with your sardonic gaze.
It’s a superbly executed work, showcasing the vulnerability and mystery of the human form, questioning its triumphs and celebrating its flaws. This latest offering should most certainly be ranked among the best of Kander, and it’s really no surprise that his star continues to rise.